A group of 11 farmers in Dagana started commercial bee-keeping two years ago. The group is doing well. The farmers say they are finding difficult to meet the demand for honey.
The Chairman of this Group, Dagapela Sebjam Tshogpa, said that they get demands from other Dzongkhags as well. “But we cannot meet the demand since we are new and cannot produce more,” said Sangay Sherpa.
The Group is in the process of making their product better by improving packaging and labeling. The Inter-graded Fruit Processing Plant in Dagapela is helping them in packaging their honey. For trial marketing, the group is taking their honey to the trade fair in Gelephu, which began yesterday.
Except for the difficulty in getting woods to make boxes to store the bees, beekeeping is easy according to the members. And it has other advantages as well. A member, Ashal Gurung, said that besides earning cash bee-keeping is also good for their oranges as it helps in pollination. “It is an easy job and can be taken up by women like us. The only problem is that we don’t get woods easily.”
The group collects bees from the nearby forest and rears it in their fields.
For the winter, most of the bee hives are empty because of the cold. They will have to look for beehives in the forest once the weather becomes warm. The Tshogpawas formed in 2010, after visiting a bee farm in Bumthang, while on a farmer’s study tour.
