Bees Overseas: helping the world's hungry

This year, our extended family has decided against giving "normal" Christmas gifts.

The kids will still get presents to unwrap, but the grownups will be making donations for international development in each other's name.

Best of all, you don't need to giftwrap a single stinging insect!

Photo: copyright Martin Heigan

Charitable gift giving lets you give someone the gift of helping someone else!

Instead of buying another thing to clutter up their house, buy a gift in their name. And give it to a child or family or village in the developing world.

Thoughtful, unexpected, helpful and easily fits under the Christmas tree!

(Also great for weddings, showers, and birthdays!)

Beekeeping is low tech, environmentally friendly, and easily scalable. A family can start with one or two hives and grow.

Bees kept near fields and orchards can double the output of fruit and vegetable crops!

Bees can also work land that isn't suitable for cultivation. Or sensitive ecosystems that need to be preserved.

Honey is a sweet blessing: clean, safe, and rich. Wax can be used for candles or sold or bartered.

Beekeeping takes work, but it doesn't need expensive fertilizers, high tech equipment, or much infrastructure at all. Hives can be made locally, employing local carpenters.

News item: Zambia hoping to double bee production

For us, it started with a gift catalogue in our local newspaper.

The World Vision 2008 Christmas Gift Guide makes it easy to buy a beehive or beekeeping kit -- veil, gloves, and smoker.

Set a family in Africa up with their own eco-friendly bee business. A hive can produce over a hundred pounds of nutritious honey each year, plus wax.

Beekeeping Kit (veil, gloves, and smoker), $60, code: 1792
Beehive, $100, code: 1800

Order online with WorldVision.ca

They don't have bees, but World Vision in the USA has a huge gift catalogue.

Warning: their site is slow loading and turn your speakers down so the audio doesn't scare the daylights out of you like it did to me!

From India to the Dominican Republic, bees from Heifer International are changing lives for the better.

$30 buys a hive from Heifer International

UK-based Hives Save Lives is probably the best known development organization promoting beekeeping as a way for the developing world to help itself.

Oh, and their homepage has the most beautiful bee photos!

The Capital Region Beekeepers Association (my bee club) supports Partnerships for Opportunity, who are bringing hives and expertise to isolated western Uganda.

We first got involved with them last winter through Larry and Marilyn Lindahl of Bees and Glass. We passed the hat, kicked in some club money, donated some gear...

And this summer, they came back and gave us the most uplifting slide show on what Ugandan villagers were doing with the bees! We knew they had turned into real beekeepers when they asked "Tell your Western friends to come and visit our bees one day. They are very nice, very gentle bees."

But they also told us that they like to put their hives near their fields to keep elephants out of the crops! "Nice gentle bees" that scare elephants away!

You can read about the Adopt-a-Beehive program here.

Afghanistan holds a special attraction for us. I come from a military family and my brother in law has served in Afghanistan. It is quite likely he will go back again before Canada's role there is done.

So World Vision's 'Help an Afghan Farmer' package is of special interest. No bees included, but for $60 you can provide farmers with an alternative to poppy cultivation. Instead of producing heroine, they'll get the training and support needed to grow pomegranates, saffron and pistachios.

Online ordering here.