Bees
hold the key to sustainable human development especially in the
rural communities. Unlike crude oil and other minerals, bees can
be exploited in a sustainable manner for economic purposes without
licenses or other legal encumbrances from government. All the
rural people need is the skill to tend the bees for sustainable
honey production to generate income; boost crop yields and improve
their nutritional and health status. In addition, bee resource
has the greatest potentials for integrated poverty reduction,
because bees can be explored to create wealth as well as redressing
health care, unemployment, hunger and environmental problems that
are critically linked to poverty.
Moreover,
agriculture is the basis of any meaningful economic development
in the rural areas, yet beekeeping is not only a core part of
agriculture, but is also has positive impact on the other forms
of farming. As a matter of fact beekeeping connects agriculture
with ecology, which are the pivot of socio-economic development
in the rural areas. In Africa, including Nigeria bee is also the
most important resource to empower the poor rural women who have
limited access to land for economic activities.
For
instance, beekeeping requires little or no land and less rigour,
which makes it an ideal vocation for the poor rural women to turn
around their economic misfortunes. Better still; beekeeping helps
to conserve the forest and other resources, the main assets of
the rural population because bees are the most effective monitor
of the environment and the best indicators of biodiversity.
In
effect, a new future for rural systems encompassing food security,
health care, secured livelihoods, gender equality and balanced
ecosystems can only be predicted on bee conservation through beekeeping
developments
