A bee keeping specialist, Mrs. Bukola Adeshina has said that the honey business has the potential to reduce hunger and poverty in the North.

In an interview with Daily Trust, Mrs Adeshina who is the Managing Director of A & Shine Honey and Ginger in Kuje, Abuja said there is a high demand for Nigerian honey abroad waiting to be exploited , adding however that northern Nigeria has the right climatic condition that is favourable for the development of bee keeping.

She noted that the honey in the north is far better than the one in the South because of the climate.

"In the South the rain is much, to get a very good honey is not possible because honey is hydroscopic, it needs a very dry place. Honey in the north is far better than in the south even when it is not adulterated", she said.

She added that the quality of honey in the North is very high because of the vegetation, pointing out that the honey produced in the South is very black while in the North one could get a more beautiful colour, (golden ), which is more accepted internationally.

Mrs Adeshina,an indigene of Ilorin in Kwara state advised the northern state governments to come to the aid of the bee keepers to enable them optimize the potential of honey in order to revitalize the economy and provide more employment opportunities for the people, adding that bee keeping is a lucrative business.

She said this is necessary because of the enormous challenges involved in the bee farming. For instance, to have a successful bee farm would require a properly designated land and fenced to keep it from bush burning.

She explained " If government can have a properly designated area, fence it, it will assist. You cannot just say you want to do it in your farm because there are so many hazards involved, e.g. if there is bush burning it will destroy the hives. If you want to do it properly and adequately with the challenge, you may have it up, if you do that to access it is difficult and climbing the tree may leave you open and the bees could sting you but if it is on the ground you can access your hives easily. If it is on ground. Again if cows pass through there, they can push them away, so the land has to be properly fenced.

To prevent bush burning from destroying your hives you need to have a proper terracing, where you may have to use sand round the place, to make sure that you remove any dry bush that could help spread fire . You can see these requirements are quite enormous. It needs government assistance if they get people that are really interested and support properly it is very lucrative."

She described honey as a wonderful product which is useful to human health and can be used for treatment of a number of ailments, including burns.

Mrs Adeshina however said it does not require a large amount of money to start a hive and could be made for about N7,000, maintaining that if properly managed it could fetch about 20 litres of honey per annum.

Initially she was buying honey from hunters and local people, after which she would squeeze out the honey, but later realized that it could be adulterated and has since stopped buying after starting her own bee farm, and the honey is subject to laboratory test and high quality control.

Recounting her experience, Mrs Adeshina said she started bee keeping in 1994 in Minna, Niger State but got officially registered in 2001 with National Incubation Centre in Minna. This was after attending the Bee Training Institute in Ibadan but on retirement from Federal University Of Technology, Minna, she decided to relocate to Kuje to set up the factory, due to lack of land.

She said ignorance and traditional belief are responsible for the seeming lack of interest in bee farming in the country despite the huge economic benefit. She said farm operators need to properly understand the behavioral pattern of bees to be able to handle them.

She explained that in beehive there is path where the bees do their running, they travel by light so if you can avoid the path and avoid perfumes that could attract them to you, that is why we have the bee suit so that even when they come on you they cannot sting.

Some people are just afraid that they cannot afford the trouble, they look cumbersome and also the fact that it is not almost immediate that you see the cash, which is part of it"

She noted that apart from Nigeria Export Promotion Council, support has come mainly from personal savings and family good will, adding banks have not helpful because of their high interest rates.

Mrs Adeshina rated Nigeria's honey as one of the best in the world, adding the country could earn a lot of foreign exchange from it if something could be done to check adulteration. She said people travel to Cameroun from all over the world to buy their honey because the country has done a lot to prevent adulteration of the product.