I received a TAAF award for a project lasting just under a year in Zambia from August 2005 to July 2006 working in the rural Copperbelt area in association with small local NGO called Kaloko Trust.

Cropping honey

Prior to this I had worked for a number of years in PR consultancy but as my heart lay in development I decided to change course and do a Masters in Environment and Development. After working with the Royal Geographical Society (with IBG), I was keen to develop my overseas field experience and found the position with Kaloko Trust, working with local subsistence farmers to set up a beekeeping cooperative.

Beekeeping is not new to Zambia - traditional methods of beekeeping include using either hives made from bark or whole logs, which results in the destruction of trees. Also, the colony is often smoked out and killed with fire to harvest the honey, not only often burning down the trees in which the hive was located, but tainting the honey and resulting in the colony absconding.

These practices are increasingly being replaced with modern beekeeping methods, however, which are more environmentally sustainable. Kaloko Trust had a well-established beekeeping programme, teaching farmers beekeeping with top bar hives, which can be made of wood, cement, or mud (below right) - meaning they are financially accessible. The advantages of these are that greater volume of honey can be harvested, the honey is better quality and hives can be reused for many years if maintained.

Beekeeping as an environmentally sustainable alternative to charcoal production which is prevalent in the area, promotes pollination as well as providing a number of avenues of income, from honey either consumed by the household, sold as it is or made into honey wine, wax for candles or used in floor polish, and in some cases the use of honey for traditional medicine.

Individual beekeepers face many difficulties which limit their ability to improve their livelihoods through beekeeping however: these include not having access to credit facilities to buy the equipment necessary to carry out beekeeping (buckets, wood, gloves etc); not having markets at which to sell their products (limited transport options, poor roads, expensive travel); poor partnership opportunities which would give access to the above opportunities; and lack of access to training to learn modern beekeeping methods and to learn basic business skills required to run a cooperative

The aim of my project was therefore to register the Luansobe Beekeeping Cooperative Society, to create a business plan to ensure its development and sustainability and to begin implementation of the business plan to ensure that these difficulties could be overcome by providing access to credit, markets, partnership and training opportunities in an environmentally sustainable manner.

During the year the cooperative was registered, the cooperative management committee (left) received training in running the organization, over 40 members joined, a handbook was drafted, a business plan was development, a micro-credit scheme set up and various training initiatives undertaken. To date, the cooperative continues to run, has an active membership base and is marketing its honey.

Upon returning to the UK my field experience was key to securing a position as a grant officer with a charitable foundation. My job involves grant-making to a wide variety of projects all over the world, and travelling to monitor their progress. Without TAAF funding and mentoring I would never have been able to spend this year working with Kaloko Trust. I'm 100% sure that without this experience I wouldn't have got my current job, where I use my development knowledge on a daily basis.