Honey producers hope for sweet success
Honey producers hope for sweet success
A honey production group in Oudomxay province hopes to open up large natural forest areas to expand bee numbers and honey production capacity, due to strong market demand.
This sustainable natural bee breeding and promotion association is in discussions with the provincial state sector on the project. “If we have a larger farm, we may be able to produce natural honey for both local and foreign buyers,” the association president, Ms Chansouk Duangvilay said.
The association can now only produce for the local market and “demand keeps increasing faster than our production capacity,” Ms Chansouk said last Friday.
The honey is sold in Oudomxay plus mainly in the Vientiane market where many people use honey as a gift. Some buyers use it for modern and traditional medicine.
“However, there is great demand but we do not have honey to sell now,” she said. “There are some foreign buyers who want to buy honey in large quantities, at least 100 litres, but we don't have it to sell to them.”
The association also needs more shareholders to allow the project to expand faster. “We hope to make honey one of the province's model products in the future,” she said.
The provincial Agriculture and Forestry Department Director, Mr Somkeo Manivanh said the association is currently studying larger farm s. They now have to be at least 7 to 10 hectares while the association proposes to increase it to about 50 hectares.
“From the state sector, we are pleased to promote the project. If we can, the project will be another tourism drawcard because the bee farms will also be a large flower plantation,” Mr Somkeo said on Friday.
“The association is now promoting a flower plantation at the provincial forest reservation for the bees.”
He said currently there are many bee breeding farms for honey production in the province, but they are small scale family farming businesses. Each has only about 200 bee hives or bee boxes.
Ms Chansouk said currently farmers breed bees at their farms and in natural forest. However, current production is at a level to provide extra income for families after investing their time and energies.
The association was established in 2012, after almost ten years of bee breeding testing for honey production with previous support from NGO German Agro Action. Originally, there were only three districts breeding bees to produce the honey, “but now there are six districts and we will expand to the seventh one soon,” she said.
The six districts cover 59 villages with 333 families and 2,856 bee hives. The association also plans to expand the project to other provinces.
“We are currently training people in Phongsaly and Luang Prabang provinces on how to breed bees for honey production”
Last year the association produced 1,422 litres of honey, however, there was about 2,000 litres in 2012.
“The quantity of honey production fluctuates depending on the weather each year,” she added.
“Some bees died because of chemical insecticides used by some local farmers and foreign forestry plantation investment projects. The cold was another cause of the death.
vientiane times
