{"id":24763,"date":"2019-05-20T07:00:45","date_gmt":"2019-05-20T07:00:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/test10.co.za\/C\/?p=24763"},"modified":"2019-05-20T08:11:12","modified_gmt":"2019-05-20T08:11:12","slug":"the-sweet-rewards-of-african-honey-bee-initiative","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/test10.co.za\/C\/the-sweet-rewards-of-african-honey-bee-initiative\/","title":{"rendered":"The Sweet Rewards of African Honey Bee Initiative"},"content":{"rendered":"

Every now and then you come across a brilliant idea. The kind that makes you sit and back and think, \u201cof course!\u201d. These ideas are often simple but the effects are complex, rewarding, and they have with the power to change lives. The African Honey Bee initiative is the perfect example of this kind of thinking.<\/p>\n

The African Honey Bee Initiative<\/h4>\n

In essence, it\u2019s so simple – they set up micro beekeeping businesses in rural communities. They also provide training, equipment, and a means of getting the honey to market. It\u2019s a clever initiative that\u2019s not only empowering communities, it\u2019s also producing some of the best natural honey in the country.
\n\"African<\/a>
\n<\/a>\"African<\/a><\/p>\n

The man behind African Honey Bee is Guy Stubbs. He\u2019s a straight-talking fellow who fell in love with beekeeping as a young man in 1981. He soon realised that selling honey was a great way to earn money, which was essential when taking girls out on dates. Fast forward many dates and some years later, and Guy has turned his passion for beekeeping into the social entrepreneurial business – African Honey Bee.<\/p>\n

\"African<\/a>

Left: Upcycling old jeans to make durable beekeeping gloves. Right: Creative beekeeping garments.<\/p><\/div>\n

How the African Honey Bee Initiative Works<\/h4>\n

At present they have around fifty beekeepers operating in rural communities, and effects have been life-changing for the inhabitants. Guy explained that they have a Christian approach that aims to empower communities with the skills to make change. It\u2019s a two-pronged approach that provides physical and spiritual upliftment. Tshepo Lebese is one of the beekeepers in Winterveld, Pretoria. He\u2019s a chicken farmer by trade and he\u2019s always had a love for mother nature. When his community was approached by African Honey Bee, he jumped at the chance to learn the trade.<\/p>\n

\"African-Honey-Bee\"<\/a>

Tshepo was originally a chicken farmer and has now added beekeeping to his repertoire.<\/p><\/div>\n

Tshepo has been keeping bees for nine months now and he says it\u2019s changed his life. With Guy\u2019s help, he\u2019s learnt how to custom build and maintain beehives. He\u2019s even learnt how to build chicken coops with materials he already had, and he now sells organic eggs. Tshepo is also part of Guy\u2019s team that trains new beekeepers. He says he loves the adventure of life and beekeeping is helping him to live the adventure.<\/p>\n

Where to from here<\/h4>\n

At the moment, South Africa produces about one thousand five hundred tons of honey annually. The only problem is that we consume almost three times as much as this, which means we have to import the shortfall. This is where things get tricky because the imported stuff, is often irradiated and ultrafiltered to a point where it actually contains no pollen. The result is sugary syrup that\u2019s devoid of nutritional benefit.<\/p>\n

Guy believes that we shouldn\u2019t have to import any honey to South Africa. Everything we need to produce enough and more is right here on our doorstep.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Last year the African Honey Bee initiative produced twenty tons of honey – and this is just from fifty producers. Guy believes that with national rollout of the African Honey Bee model, they should be able to exceed ten thousand tons per year.<\/p>\n

\"African-Honey-Bee\"<\/a>

Using creativity to make upcycled smokers.<\/p><\/div>\n

Getting to know real honey<\/h4>\n

Another big challenge with natural, raw honey is actually the consumers themselves. We\u2019ve grown up with this perception that honey should be clear and liquid. The truth is that real honey, the kind that\u2019s good for you, is often not clear and it will naturally crystallize over time. This is not a bad thing though, this is what honey is supposed to be like. Most of the cheap imported honey that you see in the shops have been heat treated and ultra-processed to stop this.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s more is that most cheap honey is actually blended from many different honeys.<\/p>\n

I picked up a cheap honey the other day in a large retail store, and there were five countries of origin on the back of the bottle. Five.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

This is the illusion of quality that we\u2019ve all bought into, when in fact it\u2019s anything but. What we should be buying is local honey that\u2019s raw, ethical and traceable.<\/p>\n

Tshepo\u2019s honey, as well as the honey from the other fifty-odd African Honey Bee producers, is collected and sold through Eat Naked. Eat what? Eat Naked, it\u2019s a new quirky brand that believes in honest, raw food with nothing to hide – naked food. Other than a light straining to remove any wax particles, the honey is as natural as you can get. Eat Naked has been partnering with African Honey Beer for one year and the response has been amazing.<\/p>\n

\"Eat<\/a>\"Eat<\/a>
\n<\/a><\/p>\n

Eat Naked<\/h4>\n

Eat Naked is now becoming more than just a retail brand by investing into the development of hives in rural areas. Just like African Honey Bee, they are believers in positive social-economic impact as well as positive impact on the environment. Eat Naked is currently supplying Dis-Chem stores nationwide. It does cost a little more than you are used to paying for supermarket honey, but as they say in life, \u201cyou get what you pay for\u201d.\"eat-naked-products\"
\n<\/a>africanhoneybee.co.za<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0| Facebook<\/a> \/\/ eatnaked.co.za<\/a>\u00a0| Twitter<\/a> | Instagram<\/a>
\n<\/strong>
\n<\/a>Read about our other beekeeping adventures…B<\/em><\/strong><\/a>eekeeping in Constantia<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0 \u00a0Urban Beekeeping in the\u00a0CBD.<\/a><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Every now and then you come across a brilliant idea. The kind that makes you sit and back and think, \u201cof course!\u201d. These ideas are often simple but the effects are complex, rewarding, and they have with the power to change lives. The African Honey Bee initiative is the perfect example of this kind of thinking. The African Honey Bee Initiative In essence, it\u2019s so simple – they set up micro beekeeping businesses in rural communities. They also provide training, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":69,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"wprm-recipe-roundup-name":"","wprm-recipe-roundup-description":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4098],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-24763","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"acf":[],"brand_slug":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/test10.co.za\/C\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24763","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/test10.co.za\/C\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/test10.co.za\/C\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test10.co.za\/C\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/69"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test10.co.za\/C\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24763"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/test10.co.za\/C\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24763\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/test10.co.za\/C\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24763"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test10.co.za\/C\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24763"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test10.co.za\/C\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24763"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}