POLLINATORS POLLINATION AND FOOD PRODUCTION

THE ASSESSMENT REPORT ON POLLINATORS, POLLINATION AND FOOD PRODUCTION
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5. BIOCULTURAL DIVERSITY, POLLINATORS AND
THEIR SOCIO-CULTURAL VALUES
5.3.5 Livelihoods of indigenous
peoples and local communities
— income, foods and medicines
(holistic valuation)
Pollinators, primarily bees, provide a source of income,
food and medicines that are vital to the livelihoods of many
indigenous peoples and local communities globally (Gupta
et al., 2014). Beekeeping provides a critical anchor for many
rural livelihoods: minimal investment is required; diverse
products can be sold; land ownership or rental is usually
not necessary; family nutrition and medicinal benefits derive;
timing and location of activities are flexible; and links to ILK
and traditions are usually numerous (Hilmi et al., 2011).
Recovery of stingless beekeeping with diverse hives and
techniques is currently underway across central and South
America (Case example 5-13, Figure 5-22).
Traditional honey-hunters in India organise to send their
honey to a local tribe cooperative where it is sold for
medicinal properties, as well as using it themselves. Prayers
and rituals accompany these harvests, linking the customary
and market economies (Barlagne et al., 2009). Ethiopian
farmers have developed beekeeping as a good source
of income, through multiplication and selling of honey
bee colonies in the local market as domesticated animals
CASE EXAMPLE 5-13
(Adgaba, 2000). Local people in Kechifo, Ethiopia both
trade white honey for both cultural and economic purposes
(Avril, 2008). Many communities in Africa keep bees for the
direct economic benefit of selling honey and other honey
bee-derived products (Adjare, 1990), and also appreciate
and value bees as a long-term means towards to improve
household food and nutritional security (Villières, 1987;
Fischer, 1993; Sanginga, 2009).
Beekeeping has improved rural household nutrition in many
subsistence farming communities across Africa (Wilson,
2006; Martins, 2014) and is used to make honey beer
(Adgaba et al., 2008). In Nigeria in both rural and periurban
settings household nutrition is improved through
beekeeping (Azeez et al., 2012). Collection and harvesting of
honey occurs across sub-Saharan Africa by: the Abayanda
of Uganda (Byarugaba, 2004); Batwa and other pygmy
peoples in the Congo Basin forests (Crane, 1999; Kajobe,
2007; Kajobe, 2008); the Hadza in Tanzania (Marlowe et
al., 2014); the Ogiek in Kenya (Rambaldi et al., 2007); and
by nomadic pastoralists in Somalia and other regions of the
Horn of Africa (Tremblay and Halane, 1993). In Australian
Aboriginal societies, stingless bee honey (sugar-bag) is a
popular food (Fijn, 2014).
Honey is also used as food for several tribes and local
communities in Indonesia, such as Anak dalam tribe
RECOVERY OF STINGLESS BEEKEEPING FOR SUSTAINABLE LIVELIHOODS IN LATIN AMERICA
Location: Mexico, Colombia, Brazil
Diverse indigenous peoples and local communities across Latin America
Stingless beekeeping probably represents one of the best
examples of a sustainable practice that is slowly recovering from
a reduction in some areas of Mesoamerica to a thriving activity
nowadays, practiced by various indigenous groups in Central
Mexico, Colombia and Brazil.
Across the Americas, detailed identification systems of stingless
bee species, their biology and behaviour is part of the knowledge
of the Maya and Nahuas groups in Mexico and Guatemala, in
the Brazilian Amazonia (by the Gorotire-Kayapo, Ticuna, Cocama
and Mura) and the Midwestern, Southeastern and Northeastern
Brazilian regions (Guarani M’Byá, Kawaiwete, Enawene-Nawe
and Pankaraé), in Ecuador (Cayapa) and the Colombian tropics
(Andoque, Eastern Tukano (Siriano and Bará) and Nukak) and
temperate regions (the U´wa) (Posey 1983b, a; Camargo and
Posey, 1990; Costa-Neto, 1998; Cabrera and Nates-Parra,
1999; Quezada-Euán et al., 2001; Rodrigues, 2005; Ballester,
2006; González-Acereto et al., 2006; González-Acereto et al.,
2008; Santos and Antonini, 2008; Rosso-Londoño, 2013).
Recently partnership efforts led mainly by academics and
universities have been reviving and strengthening stingless
beekeeping, bringing science and tradition together. Several
modern techniques and innovations have been developed
to maintain and reproduce colonies efficiently, to improve the
quality and marketability of products and also by starting to use
colonies for services such as commercial pollination. Stingless
beekeeping is showing signs of recovery for various indigenous
groups of Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, Mexico,
and Venezuela and people outside these communities are also
getting involved in stingless beekeeping and commercialization
of products.
Key elements for the recovery of stingless beekeeping have
been: teaching and extension work, respect for their local
costumes and traditions, increased value of products, and
development of a market niche for stingless bee products. Key
elements for the recovery of stingless beekeeping in the Yucatan
and Brazil have been: teaching and extension work, respect for
their local costumes and traditions, increased value of products,
and development of a market niche for stingless bee products
(González-Acereto et al., 2006; Jaffe et al., 2015).