by
Antony
Ellman
1
Background
Pemba
is the northernmost of the two islands that make up Zanzibar.It
lies off the east coast of Tanzania, 5 degrees south of the equator.It
is approximately 60km x 20km in size and has a population of some 300,000
people, plus perhaps 30 million bees.As
well as being important for honey production, Pemba is the centre of Tanzania’s
clove industry (cloves were introduced to Pemba and Zanzibar from Mauritius
in 1818, but the plantations on Zanzibar were largely destroyed by a hurricane
in 1872).A range of other spices
are grown (cinnamon, nutmeg, black pepper, turmeric, vanilla, etc), and
fruit trees many of them bee-pollinated and honey-producing such as mango,
citrus, rambutan, coconut and cashew.The
main food crops are yams, cassava, sweet potato, millets and rice, as well
as fish and other sea foods.Communications
with Tanzania and with the outside world are poor, making access to markets
for agricultural products as great a constraint as increasing production
itself.
Pemba
has strong ties with Oman - the Omani sultanate ruled Pemba and Zanzibar
until the revolution of 1964.More
recently the island has become the centre of the opposition party Civic
United Front (CUF), leading to political as well as economic isolation.Population
growth, particularly in rural areas, has placed increased pressure on scarce
agricultural land and forest resources.Poverty
is thus growing among the rural population: there is an urgent need for
intensification of land use and for more reliable sources of cash income,
to enable farmers to sustain their standard of living and to conserve their
environment.
2Evergreen
Trust
Evergreen
Trust (ET) is a small NGO established on Pemba in 1995.It
has a staff of ten who work with small-scale farmers and village groups.Initially
the primary focus of ET’s programme was on forest conservation and agroforestry
development.However, it soon became
clear that measures to increase agricultural production and improve farmers’
access to markets wereessential
if the programme was to have a sustainable impact.
The
writer was recruited to undertake, with ET staff, a survey of agricultural
production and marketing opportunities suitable for small scale producers
on Pemba, and to propose a strategy by which the producers could take advantage
of these opportunities.Prime emphasis
was to be placed on beekeeping.The
survey was conducted in February and March 2000: it encompassed visits
and discussions with farmers, beekeepers, fishermen, traders, service providers,
development agencies and Government officials.A
project proposal is in preparation which links the production and marketing
opportunities identified with the resources required for accessing new
markets.
3Beekeeping
on Pemba
There
is a long tradition of beekeeping on Pemba, particularly in combination
with clove production since clove honey commands high prices and is much
in demand in Oman.The clove industry
has declined in recent years, due to competition from Indonesia and to
monopoly marketing by the Zanzibar State Trading Corporation, and honey
production has declined with it.However,
clove honey is one of the few commodities produced on Pemba for which demand
exceeds supply: steps to raise the quantity and quality of clove honey
production can, therefore, not only generate increased rural incomes with
relatively little investment but also give farmers an incentive to improve
neglected clove plantations by adding value to the products.
The
issues identified as constraints to more productive beekeeping on Pemba
include:
·choice
of the most appropriate hive type for small scale beekeepers, in terms
of cost, productivity and manageability;
·selection
of optimal colony management and honey harvesting techniques;
·improved
procedures and channels for marketing honey and other bee products.
4Hive
type
Traditional-
most bees on Pemba are kept in open colonies up to 1.5 m long, with combs
drawn down from the branch of a tree and minimal protection against wind,
rain and invaders (particularly ants).Sometimes
the beekeeper places a plank, baited with wax, across two branches to encourage
a swarm to settle.Though the cost
of such “hives” is negligible, productivity is also low - not more than
10-20 litres of honey per year - primarily because of the energy the bees
need to expend to maintain the temperature required in the brood nest.Exposure
to the elements also makes it difficult for bees to ripen the honey, which
is therefore likely to ferment if kept for any length of time.A
lot of wax is produced in this kind of hive, but very little is marketed.Despite
low productivity, bees in such traditional colonies appear to survive the
rainy season: some sites have been continuously occupied for more than
five years.
Log
hive
- to increase productivity the Forestry Department, with help from the
Finnish aid agency FINNIDA, has over the last ten years promoted adoption
of split log hives, mostly hollowed out coconut logs 1.0-1.5m long and
0.3-0.4m diameter, hung from a branch or placed on a stand.Although
the bees are protected from the elements, experience in such hives has
been poor: theft is a major problem and the bees have a strong tendency
to abscond, perhaps because of over-heating or shortage of space and forage.In
one village visited, only 2 out of 18 log hives distributed by FINNIDA
in the mid 1990s remain and neither has bees.One
beekeeper visited on Zanzibar, however, keeps bees in mangrove swamps in
larger log hives (0.5-0.6 m diameter) made from indigenous timber species:
his experience is much better, probably linked to his careful harvesting
technique (see below).
Top
bar hive -
some beekeepers use top bar hives - rectangular boxes about 1m x 0.5m x
0.5m - where the bees in theory draw down comb from wooden slats placed
across the top of the box.Experience
with top bar hives has been even worse than with log hives: the same problems
of theft and absconding, but in addition the bees frequently draw comb
across several bars rather than attach it to one, making inspection and
harvesting very difficult.In hot
weather the combs often become detached from the bars.The
high cost of the hive (£10-£20) is an additional disincentive.
Movable
frame hives -
there are no movable frame hives on Pemba, this system being ruled out
by the cost of equipment and the complexity of management.
Table
1 summarises the positive and negative features of each hive type.A
research project to monitor productivity in each type will be undertaken
over the coming years by the Njiro Beekeeping Research Centre, Arusha.
Table
1: Pros and Cons of Different Hive Types on Pemba
|
|
|
|
|
Open
Colony
|
Low
cost
Simple
management
Difficult
to steal |
Low
production
Honey
unripe
Open
to elements and invaders |
|
Log
Hive
|
Bees
protected from elements and invaders
Yield
potential high
|
High
cost
Attractive
to thieves
Bees
tend to abscond |
|
Top
Bar Hive
|
Bees
protected
High
yield potential
Combs
recyclable |
High
cost
Attractive
to thieves
Bees
abscond Complex
management |
5Colony
Management
Most
beekeepers prefer to keep their colonies close to the main source of forage,
but this has to be balanced against the risk of theft when the forage source
is remote from the village (eg mangrove swamps, forest trees) and against
the risk of bees attacking children, neighbours or livestock when the forage
source is near the home (eg clove plantations, fruit trees, annual crops).Many
beekeepers place their hives high up in trees, but high winds and the difficulty
of reaching such colonies may outweigh the benefits.
With
the simple hive types that are in use, management techniques like swarm
control, queen replacement and even colony feeding are impossible.The
only techniques that beekeepers can easily practice are to discourage absconding
or swarming by ensuring that the bees have sufficient space to expand (particularly
important with log hives and top bar hives), to keep the hive in a cool
location with access to water, and to take great care in harvesting - i.e.
to do it at the right time, not to disturb the bees more than necessary,
to avoid destroying queen or brood, and to leave the colony enough food
for its own needs.
Most
beekeepers harvest as soon as there is honey in the hive (cloves have two
flowering seasons, mangroves flower throughout the year, other nectar sources
are more seasonal).This sometimes
leads to unripe honey being harvested.Many
beekeepers use heavy smoking or even fire to drive the bees away from the
combs, which often leads to destruction of the colony.The
best beekeepers, however, harvest frequently and gently, taking a few combs
of honey almost without the bees noticing and leaving the brood untouched
and enough stores for the bees.Experienced
beekeepers can feel inside the hive to distinguish between brood and honey
combs.Training in sustainable harvesting
techniques is a critical requirement for raising the productivity of beekeeping.
6Honey
and Wax Processing and Marketing
Much
of the value of honey and bee products is lost to the beekeepers, and indeed
to the traders and the Pemban economy, through insufficient care being
taken in processing and responding to the needs of the market.Honey
is usually squeezed out of the cut combs by hand, roughly filtered through
cotton cloth, mosquito net or coconutfibre,
and stored in bottles or plastic cans.The
product, mixed with wax, pollen, dead bees and other foreign matter, is
bought either in the village or in town by traders who repack it with little
further refining and sell locally or export it to Oman.The
price paid to the beekeepers ranges from US$2.50-5.00 per litre, while
good clove honey is reputed to fetch from five to ten times this amount
in Oman.Beeswax is not sold at
all, though Tanzania has in the past been a major exporter of wax and high
prices can be obtained in Europe and Japan.
Pemban
beekeepers currently have no organisation representing their interests;
even the traders appear to have little detailed knowledge of existing and
potential markets for honey and bee products.There
is a great need for a central processing and marketing unit which buys
honey and wax from beekeepers, pays a premium for quality, cleans and packs
bee products for the market, adds value where possible by further refining
and processing and sells to local or export markets.Discussions
with beekeepers and traders suggest that such a unit would be best run
by a local entrepreneur, with a degree of participation by beekeepers and
ET.The unit could also sell beekeeping
equipment on credit; it might play an additional role as a training and
advisory centre for beekeepers, perhaps with aid funding.
7The
Future
The
high reputation of Pemban clove honey in Gulf State markets, and the opportunities
that exist for producing and marketing beeswax and other bee products,
indicate that beekeeping can play an important part in strengthening the
Pemban rural economy.The link with
the clove industry and with pollination of other crops are added bonuses.
There
is a need for an empirical study on the productivity of bee colonies in
different hive types, for training in more productive and sustainable bee
management and harvesting techniques, and for a honey and wax processing
and marketing centre which also supplies back up services to Pemban beekeepers.The
initiative taken by Evergreen Trust is a useful first step towards satisfying
these needs.