- Near Sierra Leone’s Tiwai Island, Aruna Bangura, a young beekeeper, started a beekeeping initiative using modern hives after observing a decline in bees and increased deforestation in the region.
- The initiative began with less than 20 frame hives and has now expanded to 400 beekeepers from eight communities who have built more than 300 modern hives.
- The modern hives attract more bees compared to the traditional ones and generate money for locals so they can reduce their dependence on logging to sell charcoal, which, in turn, can help reduce pressure on the forests that the bees depend on.
- Bangura faced challenges in the initial phases of the project but has since won money from the Iris Project’s Stem Prize to kick off the project with plans to expand it.
In 2022, little did Aruna Bangura know that observing the changing environment and land use practices around his community would make him start beekeeping. The area just outside Tiwai Island, a protected wildlife sanctuary spread across 1,200 hectares (2,900 acres) in Sierra Leone, had a dearth of bees, he found.
“I observed that the bee population was declining, and starting a beekeeping initiative was the only alternative in sight,” says Bangura, a 24-year-old from the Boma community.
He founded Bangs Circular, a local organization for sustainable beekeeping practices across eight communities surrounding the island in the Eastern and Southern provinces. They began the Tiwai Honey Project, which builds hand-made beehives for the native Western African honey bee (Apis mellifera adansonii). These hives that closely monitor bees and their behavior help attract more bees compared to the traditional method, generating more honey and profit for locals so they can reduce their dependence on logging to make and sell charcoal. The effort also engages community people in restoring natural habitats through reforestation around the wildlife sanctuary. The aim is to then reduce deforestation and degradation in order to increase the bee population, which could also increase honey harvesting.
The impacts of the project are yet to be independently assessed, but so far it won the Iris Project’s Stem Prize — awarded for innovations by youth — in 2024, which gave them $10,000 to kick off the project and build new hives.
Borbor Koroma, a local beekeeper from the Kambama community, says the initiative is unique since it’s led by someone so young. “Most of the time, the elderly people don’t create space for youth to execute their ideas and initiatives,” he tells Mongabay. Amid a group of community elders who were mostly familiar with traditional beekeeping, locals say, Bangura carved an unordinary path by leading what he saw as an improved approach to traditional beekeeping.
The Tiwai Honey Project has so far trained more than 400 local beekeepers and engaged more than 1,000 people to build new hives that can earn them some money on the side.
There are no independent studies on bee decline in the region. However, tree cover in Eastern Province has receded, showing a 37% decrease since 2000, and in Southern Province, there’s been a 45% decrease since 2000. In this region of Sierra Leone, bees face pressure from deforestation, expansion for agricultural land, use of pesticides, and crop failures due to extreme weather changes.
“Starting the initiative was a whole challenge in itself as there were limited resources with not much participation from community members,” Bangura tells Mongabay.
More honey, more money?
Local communities largely depend on the aggressive Western African bee, also known as killer bees locally, for honey harvesting.
People on the island are subsistence farmers who practice traditional beekeeping. But Bangura says this is challenging given that the natural hives are located on trees, making them difficult for harvests. Traditional beekeeping uses hollow logs to build natural beehives with fixed honeycombs and limited bee management. This can lead to lower yields.
Bangura sought to build new hives like Langstroth and Zandar vertical frame hives that are movable and allow easy inspection and management of bees for better yields. With the modern ones, they can manage the colony and selective breeding of bees that aim to enhance resistance to diseases and parasites. The modern hives also make splitting of bee colonies easier, maximizing honey production.
One study from Tanzania, published in Tropical Conservation Science, found that modern hives can produce as much as 20 kilograms (44 pounds) per hive, while traditional ones can make as little as 5 kg (11 lbs).
However, the introduction of modern beehives is not always popular among traditional beekeepers in every region. In Tanzania, according to the study, beekeepers preferred the traditional logs as they are cheaper and fit cultural norms better. But Bangura says he tries to find a middle ground.
“We combine traditional knowledge focused on knowledge passed down through generations and understanding bee behavior to enhance efficiency and bee habitats,” says Bangura. “We use some traditional hive management because we currently don’t have the tools and knowledge to practice modern beekeeping.”
With the locally built hives, locals say they can monitor the hives easily and double their honey production.
“Checking the hive monthly helps improve bee health and increase honey production,” says Massah Koroma, a woman beekeeper from the Boma community. “I feed my family with the honey made organically by the local people, and the income I generate selling honey goes for my children’s school fees.”
The beekeeping season starts in January and, once they harvest the honey by May, it is bottled in 500 grams (1.1 lbs) and 1 kg (2.2 lbs) portions that are sold for $1.2 and $2.5 each. Since the beginning of the project, Bangura says, community members in Boma, Sahun and Kambama have earned the equivalent of $156 from multiple honey harvests and, on good days, they can earn around $25 per day. Meanwhile, the average income per month in Sierra Leone is $40.
The initiative started with less than 20 beehives in eight Indigenous Mende communities. It has so far built over 300 beehives, each capable of hosting up to 60,000 bees including the queen, drones and worker bees.
Members of the community say they have become more aware through training and workshops that the initiative has provided on the impacts of deforestation and the use of pesticides on the bee population.
Ensuring a direct supply chain
Borbor says Bangs Circular agreed that once the beekeepers are trained under the project, they have ownership over the beekeeping and honey harvesting. When the honey is harvested, the beekeepers work with Bangura and his team members to sell the product in the market.
While these are local businesses selling at a small scale, the product gets to consumers directly from the suppliers with no middlemen included. Most of the products are directly sold to nearby supermarkets and wholesalers. The remaining honey has good demand from tourists that visit the island, says Bangura.
“We have tied up with 10 different supermarkets and 15 wholesalers that are interested in buying the local honey,” Bangura tells Mongabay.
Locals say that, so far, the project has reduced the pressure on baji trees (Terminalia ivorensis), which they cut down for charcoal to sell in the market — though they still depend on the charcoal for their own energy needs. There are no independent studies yet confirming a reduction in deforestation, but the initiative has so far planted 5,000 trees including baji and silk-cotton trees (Ceiba pentandra) on community lands.
“We have plans to scale up,” says Bangura. “But in order to make it possible we need to continue preserving native bees realizing the enormous value these species have in ecosystem restoration and our entire food system.”
Banner image: Tiwai Honey Initiative product picture. Image © Ezekiel Kargbo for The Iris Project.
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