Women urged to adopt bee farming as profession

By Zahiruddin

CHITRAL: In continuation of its efforts to provide economic emancipation to the womenfolk in Chitral, the Regional Women Empowerment Project (RWEP) of the AKRSP has included honey beekeeping in its programme.
This was stated by project manager of the RWEP Imtiaz Ahmed while speaking at the concluding ceremony of a three-day workshop on ‘honey beekeeping as profession for women’ held here on Monday. He said that the organisation was looking for new opportunities to provide employment to the women.
He said that the workshop was arranged for the women of lower parts of Chitral. They were imparted extensive practical training, he said, adding that necessary gadgets and paraphernalia would also be provided to the participants to enable them to start the hobby in light of the training.
Mr Ahmed said that the RWEP would continue to provide technical assistance to the women at their doorsteps to enable them to adopt the honey beekeeping as a full-time profession to earn livelihood for their families and raise their standard of life.
He said that a co-sponsor of the workshop, Hashoo Foundation had pledged to market their products abroad which would bring them a lucrative income. The women would thus be linked to the national market and would not be vulnerable to the middleman who exploited them in the cottage industry, he added.
He was of the view that due to the abundance of flowering plants in the area and the long span of the blossoming period from the month of April through September, the local honey was in great demand in the market due to its special characteristics.
The RWEP official said that another co-sponsor of the workshop was WWF which provided technical resource persons who had rich experience in the field which they transmitted to the women in comprehensible language. He said that such workshops were scheduled to be arranged in upper parts of the district.
He said that training workshop on poultry farming had recently been arranged for the women of upper Chitral at Booni. He said that political empowerment of women was not possible without their economic emancipation.--Dawn