World Bee Day: A real culture of beekeeping is needed

On the occasion of World Bee Day, celebrated on May 20, Driss Louardi, an expert with numerous governmental institutions and national and international organizations in France, Morocco and the Middle East, noted that « this sector is undergoing of modernization, hence the need to accelerate the pace and to propose a Morocco-Bee Plan to establish a real culture of beekeeping…and popularize it! ».

For this doctor of science, a graduate of Diderot-Paris University, and founder of the living bee museum in Salé (project currently being redeveloped), the Kingdom, which has more than 300 endemic plants such as Harmala, has enormous beekeeping potential.

He called, in this regard, to federate all efforts and initiatives and to mobilize all energies and skills to create a real « Morocco-Bee Plan », to develop a network of local cooperatives, to strengthen the partnership between actors institutions and professional entities such as the Moroccan Interprofessional Federation of Beekeeping (FIMAP) and to encourage academic research and promote the training of beekeepers in new efficient techniques.

At the national level, the beekeeping sector has experienced a significant evolution of the modern sector, whose number of hives has increased from 110,000 in 2009 to 640,000 in 2019, an increase of +700% and 105% of the objective of the program contract beekeeping set at 610,000 modern hives in 2020, according to statistics from the Ministry of Agriculture, Maritime Fisheries, Rural Development and Water and Forests.

The sector also recorded a tangible change in the number of beekeepers, which rose from 22,000 in 2009 to 36,300 in 2019, i.e. a jump of +65%, as well as a significant increase in production, which rose from 4,717 T of honey. in 2009 to 7,960 T in 2019, i.e. an increase of +68% and 50% of the target of the beekeeping program contract set at 16,000 T in 2020.

Indeed, the beekeeping potential in Morocco is very important thanks to the very diversified honey resources, mainly Eucalyptus forests, industrial crops (sunflower, rapeseed…), natural mountain plants (Thyme, Euphorbia, Rosemary, Lavender , Mugwort), spontaneous plants and forests.

In the opinion of professionals and experts, this richness must imperatively be preserved in order to mitigate the effects of the desertion of bees from which several regions of the Kingdom have recently suffered due, among other things, to the low rainfall, the reduction in quantity and quality of the food available for the bees or even the state of health of the apiaries.

It should be noted that the beekeeping sector now has several types of labeled honey, including Euphorbia honey (Tadla Azilal), Arbutus honey (Jbel Moulay Abdeslam), Euphorbia honey (Sahara, Guelmim region and that of Souss-Massa), Zendaz honey (Fès-Boulemane) and Thyme honey (Souss-Massa).