Strengthening livelihoods - Exploring the role of beekeeping in development

edited by Nicola Bradbear, Eleanor Fisher and Helen Jackson

2002 128 pages Paperback Available from Bees for Development price £22.00 Order code B480

In September 2000 the International Symposium on Sustainable Livelihoods: exploring the role of beekeeping in development brought together 50 beekeeping development specialists, other development scientists and social scientists from 14 countries to both examine the process and structure of development while focusing on case studies of successful (and less than successful) beekeeping projects from Africa, Asia and the Caribbean.

The outcome is this publication that includes 14 presentations from the Symposium edited by Nicola Bradbear and Helen Jackson of Bees for Development, along with Eleanor Fisher, Research Officer at the Centre for Development Studies, University of Wales Swansea. The excellent Introductory Chapter ties the different presentations together and details how they all can fit a sustainable livelihoods approach, and ends with some final comments on how a sustainable livelihoods adoption might positively influence future beekeeping development initiatives.

Chapters 2 by Nicola and 3 by Eleanor speak to the sustainable livelihoods model (presented in detail in Chapter 2) and how it might help elevate beekeeping projects to a more ‘prominent position within rural development’. With its ‘people-centred’ perspective drawing on human and social capital and a focus on the rights and obligations of people to their local resources, she demonstrates how a sustainable livelihoods approach might better fit current development planning and policy that ‘involves large numbers of people, numerous institutions, a complex array of goods and services and an imperative to -meet large budgetary targets’. If evaluation is on improvement of people's lives and economic stability rather than counting the increase in number of hives or people trained in beekeeping skills, as a livelihood approach does, then beekeeping has a larger, more significant opportunity for inclusion in meaningful development projects for the future.

Chapter 4 by Catherine Butcher, a freelance consultant in natural resource management and social development, provides examples of traditional extension projects focused on information delivery to beneficiaries rather than necessarily on beekeeper needs or capabilities. She believes that such projects have ‘had a disappointing impact on beekeeping development’ in part due to use of inappropriate technology, poor extension approaches, inadequate project design and support from organisations/ institutions that had perceptions/objectives too different from the people they were trying to reach and influence. Ole Hertz (Chapter 9), a social anthropologist and beekeeper from Denmark provides a compelling example of how beekeeping extension can interface with knowledge and practice In parts of Africa where beekeeping is strongly influenced by people’s ‘traditions and beliefs, which may include magic, religion and myth.’ Alberto Arce (Chapter 10), a developmental sociologist from University of Wageningen in The Netherlands, provides an example from Mali whereby knowledge of magic was not well incorporated into project design and implementation with the result that social conflict that resulted interfered with overall project objectives and success.

Chapter 5 by Barje Svensson amply illustrates examples of extension failures in several projects he has witnessed in 25 years of beekeeping consultancies and research. He provides examples of inappropriate training of students in his (native) Sweden and Canada and of projects carried out in Bangladesh, Ghana, Guinea-Bissau, Saudi Arabia and Tanzania. He argues that ‘...smaller....realistic ....flexible’ projects where beekeepers can draw on their experience to reach hoped-for monetary rewards, are more likely to succeed.

The introductory chapter explains ‘the use of case studies and the sharing of experiences... an important part of a sustainable livelihoods approach’. Chapter 5, the next two chapters by Liana Hassan (Tanzania) and Tilahun Gebey from Ethiopia, and Chapter 12 by Svensson on targeting women for a beekeeping development project in Tanzania, provide such case studies. However Svensson cautions that ‘experiences should not be transferred from one context to another’ providing a case-in-point for a project in Saudi Arabia in which resources were not limiting (as is often the case in African projects) but which still failed due to poor acceptance by the targeted population.

In rural communities beekeeping is not a minor enterprise or hobby but can contribute significantly to family livelihoods. It fits well as a smaller, labour-intensive project without the need for a large capital outlay. In Chapter 8, David Wainwright, a director of Tropical Forest Products in the UK describes how export of honey from rural producers in remote areas of Zambia has continued even ten years after the donor agency stopped funding. Local beekeepers remain involved in making decisions of importance such as prices for their honey resulting in ‘increased honey production...motivation and a sense of equality.’

Several chapters discuss the difficulty of informed decisions on what groups to include, or exclude, from projects. In Chapter 12 Svensson question show projects that donors specify must be target specific (he uses women-targeted projects as examples) can truly be successful as only some components of beekeeping might be more appropriate for women. In Chapter 11, Mary Ann Brocklesby, a rural development and planning specialist at the University of Wales Swansea, provides an analysis of a Cameroon project that did not achieve desired success because it in part ‘categorised women as a homogeneous group’ and did not recognise how different female groups might better be able contribute to the project.

Two Chapters focus on projects in Asia. In Chapter 13, Janet Seeley, a lecturer in the School of Development Studies at University of East Anglia, UK, examines how a watershed development project was re-oriented to take on a livelihoods approach in Andhra Pradesh, India. Although no beekeeping was involved the author makes several observations of the time needed in planning so all stakeholders have adequate input into and understanding of project expectations. Chapter 14, by Pratim Roy, a co-founder of the NGO The Keystone Foundation, reports that the Foundation has discovered that honey hunters (with whom The Foundation does a lot of work) can serve as means to gain access (‘entry point’) and build confidence with local peoples. He cautions that development projects will always take time to develop and demonstrate success, something donors do not always appreciate.

Chapter 15 by Gladstone Solomon, a commercial beekeeper in Tobago, provides information on how macro-level information can be useful to development projects at the micro-level using the Caribbean Islands as an example. Success is not necessarily related just to producing products but in the assistance governmental/non-governmental agencies can provide as well.

As the Introductory Chapter explains, all the projects mentioned in this publication ‘aspire’ to the goal of greater sustainability. A sustainable livelihoods approach ‘may contribute to beekeeping projects providing a framework to link concern about environmental and agro-ecological sustainability, to economic, institutional, human and socia} initial reading.

Review by Dewey M Caron