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Researcher nets green prize
BEE RESEARCHER NETS GREEN PRIZE
A British scientist has won a coveted environment research prize for showing how bees can be used to reduce conflict between people and elephants. Lucy King's work proved that bee hive "fences" can keep elephants out of African farmers' fields and compounds.
The elephants are scared of bees, which can sting them inside their trunks, and flee when they hear buzzing. Dr King received the UNEP/CMS Thesis Prize at the Convention on Migratory Species (CMS) meeting in Norway. "Her research underlines how working with, rather than against, nature can provide humanity with many of the solutions to the challenges countries and communities face," said Achim Steiner, executive director of the UN Environment Programme (UNEP). "Dr King's work spotlights an intelligent solution to an age-old challenge, while providing further confirmation of the importance of bees to people and a really clever way of conserving the world's largest land animal for current and future generations."
The African-born scientist, whose research was supervised at Oxford University, said she was delighted and surprised to receive the prize, which is given every three years to a particularly outstanding PhD thesis in the conservation field. "I could not believe it when I heard - it was such a boost, and a wonderful thing to be recognised at that level," she told BBC News. "Especially after spending five years out in the bush bouncing around in a Land Rover - it was wonderful."
Working in Kenya, Dr King and her team showed that more than 90% of elephants will flee when they hear the sounds of buzzing bees. Subsequently, they also Bees for Development Journal 65 found that elephants produce a special rumble to warn their fellows of the danger. They used the findings to construct barriers where hives are woven into a fence, keeping the elephants away from places where people live and grow food. A two-year pilot project involving 34 farms showed that elephants trying to go through the fences would shake them and disturb the bees. The fences were adopted by farming communities in three Kenyan districts - who also increased their incomes from selling honey.
Working with the UK charity Save the Elephants, Lucy King now wants to see whether the Kenyan technique will work in other parts of Africa - and perhaps, eventually, in Asia. "I cannot say for certain it is going to work elsewhere, but there is potential to take it down to southern Africa which has the largest elephant population and an increasing humanelephant conflict problem," she said.
Source: Richard Black, BBC News, 23 November 2011 www.bbc.co.uk/news
Editor’s note: In BfDJ 65 the article Guardian bees discussed using bees to reduce human conflict with elephants. This article is on our information portal - see website address above,
STOP PRESS
Guiding Hope wins Award
We are pleased to announce that (Bf D partner organisation) Guiding Hope of Cameroon has won first prize in the prestigious Best New Business category at the 2011 Africa Small Medium and Micro Enterprise Awards.
The Award is a major recognition for over five years of hard work from a team of six, and over 1,000 beekeepers in the remote savannah and highland forests in the Congo basin.
Guiding Hope sells over 120 tonnes of beeswax, propolis and honey a year to buyers in the UK, Europe and Canada and is working hard to keep up with demand. The organisation’s core trading principles are to support local communities, trade fairly and profitably, and to look after the environment.
More at www.beesfordevelopment.org/news
