By Betty Luke
Bee keepers groups in Kinna, Ngaremara, Bulapesa, Wabera and Burat wards have received a major boost following the donation of modern beehives and harvesting gears, beehive stands and storage tanks to support their diversification into reliable sources of livelihood.
The 14 women and youth groups, each received 14 beehives that will support them produce high-quality honey for both the local and national markets.
Each of the groups has a membership of 30 farmers.
The European Union-funded project, which is being implemented by the E4Impact, seeks to support women groups to adopt alternative sources of income as well as reduce reliance on livestock keeping that has proven unreliable due to the changing weather patterns in different parts of the country.
Beneficiary Flavia Ekamais lauded the aid saying it would greatly boost their beekeeping efforts as they had been using the traditional hives posing numerous challenges to the activity.
“The hives seem to be simpler to handle than the ones we have been using. Harvesting too has been made easy, meaning a woman cannot keep bees, harvest and sell their honey without support from the men,” she noted adding initially, honey harvesting was a men’s affair.
Apart from the donations, the groups have also received capacity building on matters of beekeeping, sourcing the market, financial management and record keeping to enable them to comfortably start and run the ventures.
“I thought bees were enemies but E4Impact has made me understand that they can be my good friends and earn me an income,” said Ms Abdia Gedi, a beneficiary.
Another beneficiary, Stephen Epumong, called on the residents’ the majority of whom are predominantly pastoralists to embrace beekeeping as it would not be affected by cattle rustling which has been a major threat to their animal keeping.
Livestock Chief Officer Isaiah Epuri said the donations would greatly boost honey production in the county to meet the high demand of the market as well as make use of the local refinery center that he said was not meeting its intended expectations.
“The refinery has been lying idle since its capacity is higher than what is locally produced. We therefore hope that help offered today will enable us to achieve maximally,” he told The Press Point.
According to the official the department was hoping to harvest at least two tonnes of honey per harvest up from the current 200 liters.
He said the county government was committed to supporting residents to adopt other sources of income instead of fully relying on livestock production.
E4Impact Country Director Bernadette Mutinda said they had mainly focused on women as they were the least engaged in matters of livestock keeping and to enable them to provide their families with basic needs.
Apart from the startup kits, she revealed that they had already linked the farmers with a ready market that would buy all their produce.
