Its been said before, the game changer here is the poly nucs, they're bloody great at overwintering, and building up, small colonies. I hazard to say it, but they are particularly suited to native bees with their smaller wintering clusters. I think once their ease of use and high success rate gets embedded in association culture then beekeepers will adopt them on mass, and producing their own replacements and some surplus for sale will become second nature, thus eclipsing the need for large scale imports.