Hello Walter Mwasaa.
My community is ever increasing on its capacities to respond to shocks. We are a beekeeping group in Zimbabwe and as we look backwards, the past few years we have been improving in the way we respond to shocks. We really acknowledge our resilience capabilities that has enabled the households and community to remain functional. Our desire and passion to keep bees as a livelihood option has increased in the community and a number of households are getting some honey for their own consumption, are making sales to generate income that enables them to send children to school and also schools are running clubs under the beekeepers Association and this has enabled the club members to pay for their fees and also the generated income at the school has also been used to buy stationary at the school. The model of schools getting into beekeeping is also attracting many schools who are likely to join the Association soon. We have also as beekeepers encouraged one another to establish trees that go with crops in the same area and also those that can be planted on the same farm with crops but on an area that is not good for crops. Such trees include avocado, peaches, mangoes, citrus and apples. Some exotics planted on other areas included Eucalyptus species , acacia species etc and these are multipurpose trees which are bee friendly. Also crops are being inter-cropped near apiaries with sunflower, sugar beans, cow peas, soya beans okra, water melons, butter nuts and pumpkins being the most favored. Edible weeds such as black jack is also left to thrive in areas which are closer to apiary sites as this is an important source of bee food. The attached photos show areas closer to apiary sites that are being used to produce crops, fruits and honey at the same time. This model that we are using integrates crop production and bee farming and provides several livelihoods options to our community.
From ROBERT
M. Robert Mutisi