Bee - Keeping : Africa potential in honey industry high

By Charles Mkoka

The just ended Gender Climate Change and Agriculture Support Programme (GCCASP) second conference held from the 3 – 5 in Durban, South Africa created a platform for women to showcase diverse agribusiness initiatives from their respective countries across the continent.

Edna Kalima, Programme Officer, New Partnership for African Development said climate change is causing significant damage to economies and environment resulting in Africa being greatly affected as exposure is increasingly high while its capacity to respond is very low. As such agriculture diversification is critical to build climate change resilience and mitigate the effects.

Kalima added that smallholder agriculture is the most vulnerable sector dominated by women farmers who account for over 80 percent of the continent food production. Women and youth are highly vulnerable and are most likely to be disproportionately affected by the adverse effects of climate.

GCCASP entailed the design process of a detailed situation analysis of smallholder women farmers through case studies and consultations in five African countries namely; Cameroon, Ethiopia, Malawi, Niger and Rwanda. The five countries represent the eight Regional Economic Communities of the African Union.

Harriet Manduwa, a woman entrepreneur from Tithandize Cooperative located on the outskirts of Lilongwe said she started beekeeping in 2011 and owns an apiary with a number of hives.  Manduwa brought bottled honey which she displayed on the sidelines of the conference at the Durban International Convention Centre.

How much honey is produced per hive? Manduwa said that a single hive produce up to 15 kilograms of honey. She added that within the cooperative some members own over 100 bee hives. This means more honey, when the total bee hive harvests are combined.
But how did Manduwa venture in the enterprise?  The cooperative was trained by a Lilongwe University of Agriculture and Natural Resource student who had the technical know how. Manduwa got encouraged to be a self starter, reliant and embrace bee-keeping as a worthwhile enterprise.

“I have built a house, own cattle from the benefits that I have been able to accrue from my apiary harvests since embarking in bee-keeping as a business,” said Manduwa in an interview on the sidelines of the event.

At continental level African Union - Inter African Bureau for Animal Resources (AU-IBAR) recently held training in Lilongwe which offered theory and practical to enhance the capacity of beekeepers association members and extension workers to acquire information on beehive products, post-harvest handling, utilized improved bee health, pollination services technologies and innovations.

During the meeting it transpired from AU experts that beekeeping can play a significant role in contributing to food and production of bee products for the market, as well as fostering sustainable environment practices.

“Global business of honey industry contributes to over US$ 200 billion to the global economy through crop pollination. It is estimated that 71 percent of crops that provide 90 percent of the world’s food requirements are pollinated by bees, production of honey beeswax and other bee hives products. However, Africa only gets a teaspoon of less than 10 percent while the potential of the sector is huge," A top Malawian government official said during the opening session.

A communiqué signed after the training exercise expressed regret that Africa has failed to tap on this opportunity and strategic industry to generate food, employment, environment conservation and diversification.

A least three representatives comprising of one woman from each country were trained to be in charge of rolling out the training at country level to other nation’s association’s representatives.

The training on beekeeping complimented the Vet-Gov Project in rolling out the AU-IBAR data base through which information on honey production, bee health and pollination services will be reported on the bee reference data base portal.