The main goal of our project is to increase the incomes and reduce the financial uncertainty of different beekeeping groups, located in Tanzania. Last year’s students already went to four of the six different groups and provided them with new beekeeping material and the right beekeeping knowledge. With the groups who made a lot of progress our team will focus on more advanced beekeeping techniques, which will be fundamental to further professionalize their beekeeping activities. Because there are two new groups (compared to the previous year) we will still aim at delivering the right basic beekeeping techniques and materials for them as well. Since some of last year’s groups didn’t make the expected progress, we will look at the problems they are facing and  try to find an appropriate solution in close cooperation with them.

 

The next step is to go ‘from honey to money’. In order to be able to get a fair price for the produced honey a collection house will be build. In this collection point, beekeepers will be able to deliver their raw honey and wax products where they can be further processed. Advanced and qualitative equipment will be present at this collection point, as well as a storage room, a marketing/sales room and an education room. The goal is to increase the quality of the produced honey and to make it market ready (labeling). Besides, the collection house will have all the necessary equipment to make value added products from honey and wax (soap, body lotion, candles, honey candy…) which can be sold as well. The educational room in the collection house can be used for e.g. schools and offers an excellent opportunity to deliver information and provide (re)training.​ In order to be able to construct this collection house and its equipment, raising the needed amount of money (by applying for grants and our crowdfunding campaign) is of crucial importance.

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A third goal is to connect the different beekeeping groups and all related parties. By using the common collection house (with an educational room) the different groups can come together, exchange knowledge and experiences and discuss possible problems. The next ‘connecting link’ goes even further and involves local carpenters, farmers and markets. Since bees are very effective pollinators, farmers will benefit from beekeeping related activities (increased crop yields) and they can be actively involved into the beekeeping project.

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A final and important aspect of this project is the standardization of beehives, which means that the properties of all hives should be the same, in order to easily exchange materials or replace broken parts. The goal is to provide mechanical drawings and plans for the carpenters so they can easily deliver these standard beehives for the beekeeping groups.

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