Guwahati: The North Eastern Hill University (NEHU) has adopted five villages in Meghalaya’s West Garo Hills district to transform them into honey centres.
NEHU Vice Chancellor Prof. P. S. Shukla recently inaugurated the adoption of the Honey Village project.
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Speaking at the event, Frederick A Sangma, Functional Manager, DCIC Tura & Nodal Officer, Apiculture Mission gave a short introduction about the program.
He demonstrated to the people how beekeeping will help in the development of the village by improving the livelihood of future generations.
The positive effect given by beekeeping is that they promote pollination and also produce honey which will give employment to the farmers doubling their income.
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The plants were also selectively chosen for each month and grown so that there won’t be a shortage of flowers for the bees to feed on. This is the reason for beekeeping being called a green industry.
Dr. R. Sasikumar, Nodal Officer, Incubation Centre, NEHU, Tura Campus, said he with his team contacted DCIC Tura and joined hands to work for Apiculture Mission.
They conducted skill training for potential apiculture farmers in the Incubation Centre of NEHU, Tura Campus.
A total of 150 apiculture farmers were identified from 5 villages, namely AmindaAding, AmindaRangsa, AmindaSimsanggre, and Chigitchakgrevillage, from Gambegre C&RD blocks, West Garo Hills, Meghalaya.
The apiculture farmers were trained successfully and input support kits were distributed. Each Apiculture Input Support kit includes bee boxes, bee nets, extractors, and other equipment and was funded under North East Hill (NEH) Scheme, ICAR.
He also stated that more Apiculture Input Supports will be provided based on the performance of the farmers.
The NEHU programme was implemented by ICAR-NIBSM, Raipur, Chhattisgarh in collaboration with NEHU since 2019 for the welfare and socio-economic development of farmers in the Northeast.
The said scheme is implemented under the able guidance and leadership of Dr. P. K. Ghosh, Director, ICAR-NIBSM and Dr. P. Mooventhan, Senior Scientist, Nodal Officer, ICAR NIBSM, coordinating all developmental activities with NEHU for the betterment of the farming community.
In addition, a memorandum of understanding (MoU) was also signed between ICAR-NIBSM and NEHU under this programme.
VC Shukla in his speech said the Incubation Centre, NEHU Tura Campus will extend all types of support such as capacity building programme, technical input support, quality assurance, trade mark and branding, and intelligent marketing at domestic and international level.
“Our Incubation Centre NEHU will sign a buy-back agreement with appropriate governing bodies to popularise Wild Organic Honey from Meghalaya origin into the international market,” he said.
Regarding, quality assurance, the Incubation Centre, NEHU Tura Campus has already established well equipped Advance Food Testing Laboratory at NEHU Tura Campus, and also having full-fledged processing plants which are maintained by Incubation Centre NEHU Tura Campus.
Shukla said this Honey village will able to produce 100% pure wild organic honey roughly 10,000 kg/year through modern scientific methods with green processing.
“This honey village will be a role model for the entire nation and also enhance the livelihood standard of rural people, which will be highly possible to increase the growth rate of Meghalaya from 2 to some extent,” Shukla added.