Bees Abroad
We're looking for our next Chair and three new Trustees
About Us
We promote the craft of locally appropriate beekeeping in sub-Saharan Africa to enable communities to empower themselves by creating opportunities for equitable income generation, sustainable livelihoods and improved quality of life. We work predominantly with women's groups and promote methods of beekeeping which support the environment, improve crop pollination and use locally sourced materials wherever possible. We develop, support and train in-country partners to become proficient independent, self-sustaining and self-sufficient beekeeping trainers.
Honey is an incredibly valuable and versatile commodity, regarded as both a food and a medicine and this is reflected in the average price per kilo at £5 (which is greater than the daily income in many of the areas where we work). Teaching sustainable beekeeping, in conjunction with tree planting, can make a significant difference to household income and create greater resilience to external shocks (often climate induced).
We have been working with communities in sub-Saharan Africa for over two decades and currently we have over thirty active projects across Uganda, Kenya, Nigeria, Tanzania, Ghana, Rwanda and Sierra Leone where our Bees Abroad trainers are today helping over 1,370 participants learn sustainable beekeeping.
In recent years our income has increased substantially to £183,000 per year and we have made the transition from a 100% volunteer-led organisation to one with a full time CEO and employees focused on donor stewardship and fund-raising. We are a small charity but we are proud to say we make a disproportionate impact. Our ambitions are to increase our funding base significantly from its traditional support base of the UK beekeeping community so that we can further support communities to become self-sustaining in their beekeeping and create a source of diversified income.
These exciting expansion plans mean we need more committed trustees with specialist skills and bags of enthusiasm. We are looking for three new Trustees. In addition, we also seek our next Chair of Trustees as Richard Ridler comes to the end of his term.
Bees Abroad is a UK Charity (1108464).
