World Bee Day
World Bee Day is observed on 20 May each year to draw attention to the essential role bees and other pollinators play in keeping people and the planet healthy. It provides an opportunity for governments, organizations, civil society and concerned citizens everywhere to promote actions that will protect and enhance pollinators and their habitats, improve their abundance and diversity, and support the sustainable development of beekeeping.
By observing World Bee Day each year, we can raise awareness of the essential role bees and other pollinators play in keeping people and the planet healthy, and in the many challenges they face today. The date for this observance was chosen as it was the day Anton Janša, a pioneer of modern apiculture, was born. Janša came from a family of beekeepers in Slovenia, where beekeeping is an important agricultural activity with a long-standing tradition.
In Kenya, beekeeping is now being practiced by few people commercially but it has great potential, especially by exploiting other hive products apart from honey like bee venom, bee wax, bee propolis, and royal jelly.
The bee-keeping institute, a government organization has several trainings in a year for basic bee-keeping skills and has recently started a value addition course for hive products.
Beekeeping can be exploited as an economic activity that promotes environmental conservation and brings communities together when the activity is done by an organized group either at the apiary management level or at the value addition and marketing level through cooperatives.
