Goa, 21 May 2021

ICAR- Krishi Vigyan Kendra, North Goa and ICAR-Central Coastal Agricultural Research Institute CARI, Goa, celebrated “World Bee Day” on 20th, May 2021. A one-day programme entitled ‘Augmenting rural income: The Beekeeping way’ was organized virtually at ICAR-CCARI Goa. Dr B L Kashinath, Principal Scientist and Head, KVK, North Goa, welcomed the guests and briefed about the training program. Dr Lakhan Singh, Director, ICAR-ATARI, Pune, Maharashtra was the Chief Guest of the programme. Dr Parveen Kumar, Director, ICAR-CCARI, Goa, explained the background of celebrating World Bee Day on May 20 every year from 2018 and onward. He explained that the United Nations Council accepted the proposal from Slovenia to celebrate 20th May, the birth anniversary of the pioneer of beekeeping  Anton Jansa, from Slovenia, as World Bee Day. The purpose of observing World Bee Day is also to acknowledge the role of bees and other pollinators in the ecosystem. The programme was attended by 52 participants which included farmers, officials of the Directorate of Agriculture, scientists, subject matter specialists, technical staff of the KVK, North Goa and the ICAR-CCARI, Goa. Dr. Lakhan Singh, Director, ICAR-ATARI, Pune, Maharashtra explained the significance of beekeeping in augmenting the income of farmers. He briefed the success stories of beekeeping with the example of Madhushakti which is a start-up project initiated by 100 women in Pune for 2 years and now ventured into FPO with branding and marketing of honey and earning additional income to farming. He emphasized that the KVKs showcase beekeeping by having units on their campus for training and demonstration. He also urged a need to create network groups of beekeepers and provide common processing and marketing facilities to them.

In the technical session lectures on ‘Scientific Beekeeping for augmenting rural income’ by Mrs. Shishira Uttappa and ‘Meliponiculture - Beekeeping through stingless bees' by Shri. HRC Prabhu, Subject Matter Specialist (Plant Protection) was delivered. These talks covered scientific bee-keeping husbandry practices, benefits, capital requirements, marketing, networking, branding and success stories of beekeeping and how to get maximum income Meliponiculture, etc.  In the end, I conducted an interactive session with farmers and scientists.

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ICAR/VK/PK

 

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