Bees without Borders
Bees Without Borders
What do bees have to do with poverty alleviation? A nonprofit founded by a beekeeping expert has found that the two can go hand-in-hand.
Bees Without Borders exists to educate and train impoverished individuals and communities how to keep bees. Volunteers travel to places such as Cuba and the Ukraine to show beekeepers how to increase their honey production and how to create markets for beeswax products such as soaps and candles.
Why try to alleviate poverty using bees? For starters, honey is a more stable product than most cash crops because it does not spoil. Also, only a couple of hours a week are needed to maintain a hive so beekeeping requires little time. A farmer can still keep their primary job while maintaining a hive for supplemental income.
Bees Without Borders is also trying to keep beekeeping alive. For many small beekeepers, it just isn't economically feasible to tend to hives anymore. Colony Collapse Disorder has played a major role, along with natural disaster and war. In Iraq, for example, the New York Times reports that because of oil-field fires, smoke and the repercussions of war, the number of tended hives has plummeted from 500,000 to 20,000 since the beginning of the Gulf War.
Considering the state of the industry, Bees Without Borders may offer the best hope for bees and beekeepers in many of the world's poorest countries.
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