PAVIK Beekeeping Production and Innovation Cooperative from Cherkasy Oblast won a bronze medal for Innovations in Beekeeping Products at ApiExpo-2023 international exhibition in Chile.

The head of the enterprise, well-known Ukrainian beekeeping inventor Yurii Huslii, received a bronze medal (third place in the world) for the industrial technology of producing bee bread. The technology was created by a group of scientists from the National University of Biological Resources and Natural Resources Management of Ukraine, and the cooperative developed its tools. This is a whole line of equipment for the production of high-quality industrial-scale bee bread at minimal cost. The technology was invented 20 years ago, but its practical implementation has only become possible now thanks to the efforts of Huslii and his team.

According to Huslii, bee bread is one of the most promising beekeeping products. It is fermented plant pollen that is collected by honeybees, soaked in nectar, put into honeycomb cells, tamped down and filled with honey.

“Many health-conscious people buy and regularly consume this valuable bee product, and our equipment helps to significantly increase its production and improve its quality. PAVIK’s equipment for industrial production of bee bread is already being actively purchased by beekeepers around the world. This technological breakthrough is the result of our joint work with leading Ukrainian scientists over the years. The equipment is relatively small and can be sent by post. We are pleased that it has received due attention from beekeepers during the 48th Apimondia International Congress and ApiExpo, in which we participated together with other beekeepers and producers,” said Huslii.

According to Ruslan Markov, USAID ERA Honey Sector Lead, the products of PAVIK cooperative demonstrated their competitiveness and innovation during ApiExpo-2023. Beekeepers from all over the world are looking at samples of its equipment, giving them the highest possible rating and showing interest in purchasing them for their apiaries. It is unfortunate that the benefits of this technology are not yet sufficiently appreciated by domestic beekeepers, who have great potential to increase their production of bee bread. Currently, the equipment is mostly purchased by foreign beekeepers.

“Bee bread is a very valuable product, the production of which can significantly increase the profitability of professional Ukrainian apiaries. While the average wholesale price of bee pollen on the domestic market is currently around UAH 200 per kilo, the price of bee bread reaches UAH 1,000 per kilo. That is, the income from the production of bee bread is several times higher than the income from the production of bee pollen at almost comparable costs. We hope that the dissemination of information about PAVIK’s international achievements will help to increase the scale of implementation of industrial technology for the production of bee bread in Ukraine,” said Markov.

With the support of USAID Economic Resilience Activity (ERA), 10 beekeeping equipment manufacturers, beekeepers and representatives of the Ukrainian Beekeepers Union took part in the international ApiExpo exhibition, which took place on 4–8 September in Santiago, Chile.

The delegation included representatives of 10 export-oriented Ukrainian micro, small and medium-sized enterprises – companies processing honey and other beekeeping products, manufacturers of beekeeping equipment and suppliers of IT services for beekeepers. The delegation also included two representatives of the governing bodies of the Union of Beekeepers of Ukraine and two USAID ERA specialists.

With the assistance of USAID Economic Resilience Activity (ERA), 10 beekeeping equipment manufacturers, beekeepers, and representatives of the Ukrainian Beekeepers Union participated in the international ApiExpo exhibition held as part of the 48th Apimondia World Congress.

The event ran from 4–8  September in Santiago, Chile.

The delegation included representatives of 10 export-oriented Ukrainian micro, small and medium-sized enterprises – companies processing honey and other beekeeping products, manufacturers of beekeeping equipment and suppliers of IT services for beekeepers. The delegation also included two representatives of the governing bodies of the Union of Beekeepers of Ukraine and two USAID ERA specialists.

On the first day of the exhibition, Temporary Charge d’Affaires of Ukraine to the Republic of Chile Vladyslav Bohorad attended the event. He promised to assist exhibitors and representatives of the honey sector to help establish business partnerships.

One participant of the event is entrepreneur Oleksandr Stoliarov. For four years, he has been developing “Bee House” production of polyurethane foam beehives in Kyiv. Before the war, he shipped his beehives all over the world, but now, he says, logistics have become much more expensive, so he will be looking for new partners at Apimondia to supply them with modern beehives.

“Since the start of the war, sales of beehives have fallen by up to 80%, and it took us a year to get back to pre-war volumes. We sold them to Hawaii, Lithuania, and Portugal. For example, the price in Hawaii has increased fourfold, so it is not economically viable to ship there. Now our new sales channel is our beekeepers who went abroad because of the war but continue to be engaged in beekeeping there. Two years ago, we were approached by Chilean beekeepers, and I hope that they will be interested in our beehives because they will be able to hold them in their hands and assess their quality. Beekeepers from all over the world come to Apimondia, which is definitely a new opportunity and a new experience,” says Stoliarov.

Denys Lahoda, an entrepreneur from Melitopol and head of VRM-Agro, was also part of the delegation. He left occupied Melitopol, but all his new equipment for wax processing and production remained in occupation. Now Lahoda is resuming production in Kharkiv Oblast. Even before going to the congress, he held talks and arranged meetings with potential partners from Canada and the United States. Lahoda’s company is also engaged in wholesale sales of honey for export. Currently, the main buyers are the countries of the European Union: France, Croatia, Spain, Belgium, Germany, the Netherlands, and Austria. These are mainly wholesale buyers who then resell the honey in Europe or pack it in small containers and work with retailers.

“Our foreign partners are very interested in us supplying them with Ukrainian wax. Back in Melitopol, we set up a line to produce wax without impurities, pure wax, which is exactly what they want to buy from us. I have already received offers from businesses that are interested in cooperating with us, I will talk about our technology, and I hope that this trip will be fruitful,” says Lahoda.

With the support of USAID ERA, Ukrainian producers could present their products and services, understand the current requirements of the export market, and create direct business connections that translate into sales in the Ukrainian honey sector.

According to Ruslan Markov, Honey Sector Lead of USAID Economic Resilience Activity (ERA), the first day of the exhibition showed that the world’s beekeeping community is paying great attention to Ukraine’s honey business. “There are always a lot of visitors around our stand. They try samples of Ukrainian honey and other beekeeping products, look closely at modern Ukrainian-made beekeeping equipment, get acquainted with our technologies to produce high value-added goods, ask many questions and discuss possible cooperation. We already have preliminary proposals for export contracts. It can also be said that the beekeeping community is not indifferent to the problems of Ukrainian beekeepers affected by the war. Visitors to the event are interested in the state of the industry in the face of war and express their personal support for the people of Ukraine.

“Participation in such an event is very important not only for USAID ERA partner companies. It allows us to restore the position of Ukraine’s powerful honey industry in the global market. We have brought with us and are distributing information materials about other Ukrainian companies that are interested in exporting their products. The whole world needs to understand that this industry continues to operate, even in the difficult conditions of war and attempts at a naval blockade. Ukraine is ready to export its high-quality, modern products and successfully compete with other world leaders in this field. This exhibition in Chile also allows us to open our honey industry to South American countries that are not yet sufficiently aware of our potential. This is a kind of opening of Ukraine to the Spanish-speaking part of the global honey business. The contacts made during the business meetings will form the basis for the industry’s work in the coming years, and the ideas gained during communication will form the basis for strategic planning of the industry’s development for the next decades.”

The delegation members have real potential to enter new markets. Over the past year, USAID ERA consultants have been providing appropriate assistance to these partners, and organized and conducted business meetings during the event.

Participation in this exhibition will help Ukrainian beekeepers, beekeeping product processors and beekeeping equipment manufacturers to present the Ukrainian honey industry, find new partners, and thus continue their business activities, increase revenues, and contribute to the preservation and creation of new jobs.

During Apimondia Chile 2023 World Congress and ApiExpo exhibition, which took place in Chile on 4–8 September, AmoHive presented its new project, AmoHive IT Beekeeping.

During the event, the development team held direct talks with representatives of universities and beekeepers’ associations from the USA, Canada, Argentina and Brazil to discuss the placement of SMART beehives in their research apiaries and their connection to a common database. This will provide a unique set of data on the life of bees in different countries, which will form the basis for analyzing problematic issues and planning the development of global beekeeping.

According to the company’s representative, Oleksandra Kurdina, their idea is very attractive not only to scientists and beekeepers, but also to young people. This technology can help motivate young people to learn beekeeping and start their own beekeeping business.

During the exhibition, AmoHive won the competition for best beekeeping photo.

The photo received a silver medal at the 48th Apimondia World Congress. The photo shows a moment of communication between the Honey Sector Lead of USAID Economic Resilience Activity (ERA) Ruslan Markov at the first IT apiary in Ukraine with professors from Volodymyr Dahl East Ukrainian National University during a training event in June 2023.

This recognition will help to promote the initiative widely in the beekeeping community.

AmoHive has set up Ukraine’s first IT apiary in Kyiv region and plans to provide IT beekeeping training for young people in partnership with Ukrainian agricultural education institutions.

At the end of last year, this invention won an honorable mention in the Best Innovative and Technological Solution in 2022 category at the European Bee Awards. The project is based on a SMART beehive equipped with sensors that operate autonomously using a solar panel and regularly transmit a set of data to a server and mobile application. This data is accumulated and processed using Big Data analysis technology. Obtaining this information allows the beekeeper to respond in advance to humidity and temperature in the hive, which will ultimately lead to improved performance.

With the support of USAID Economic Resilience Activity (ERA), 10 beekeeping equipment manufacturers, beekeepers and representatives of the Ukrainian Beekeepers Union took part in the international ApiExpo exhibition, which took place on 4–8 September in Santiago, Chile.

The delegation included representatives of 10 export-oriented Ukrainian micro, small and medium-sized enterprises – companies processing honey and other beekeeping products, manufacturers of beekeeping equipment and suppliers of IT services for beekeepers. The delegation also included two representatives of the governing bodies of the Union of Beekeepers of Ukraine and two USAID ERA specialists.

“Amohive”, a Ukrainian-Polish “IT apiary” project has both an educational and scientific mission, which the USAID Economic Resilience Activity (ERA) supports.

Currently, the technology-centered apiary consists of 10 experimental polypropylene hives equipped with solar panels and sensors that a beekeeper can control from a smartphone. The information from the sensors is transmitted to the server and from there to the phone. Through a mobile application, one can check the temperature in the hive, moisture, real-time weight, and the amount of honey collected, and there is also a GPS navigator function. A team of specialists from Ukraine and Poland developed such a hive, and the patent for their invention was filed in Ukraine.

Aleksandra Kurdina, co-creator of the “Amohive” project, said that in May 2023, these hives were populated by bee families of three breeds – Ukrainska stepova, Karpatka, and Karnika. Now, they monitor the bees’ behavior at the apiary and, if necessary, they can regulate the temperature and humidity in the hive, as these indicators affect the incidence of bee diseases and, consequently, the result of their work – the amount of honey collected.

“Ukraine collects a lot of honey every year because it has an excellent climate for this. Thousands of beekeepers are involved in this business, but everything that happens in apiaries is as it was in the 19th century. We tried to modernize the process – to combine IT and beekeeping in order to facilitate the work of the beekeeper, to provide access to information about the processes taking place in the hive itself, in order to respond to them in time. Now, there are 10 experimental hives. Our project requires a lot of observations and research, and so we will be happy to cooperate with schoolchildren and students and spread the ideas of IT-centered  beekeeping”, says Kurdina.

Kurdina is also inviting educators and scientists to cooperate with them. Professors and postgraduate students of the ERA-supported Volodymyr Dahl East Ukrainian National University (V. Dahl EUNU) have already expressed their readiness to join the research and offered ideas on what other indicators could be added to the beehive sensors.

“Bees can be used in various fields. For example, at a man-made object, to find out whether it is safe for a person to be there. Such a smart hive can be placed near such objects, and we observe the behavior of bees to make decisions that are safe for humans. Other sensors can be added to the proposed sensors to collect more information that is important in a certain location. The students and I would like to participate in such research,” said Vadym Tarasov, Dean of the Faculty of Human Health,V. Dahl EUNU.

Snizhana Leu-Severynenko, the ERA Senior Manager of Workforce Development noted that such an “IT apiary’ is an interesting and innovative idea that will help develop several courses in the future – for schoolchildren, students of vocational and higher education institutions. ERA is working with businesses in order to provide employment opportunities for youth in particular, which will ensure long-term results for Ukraine.

“The world is changing rapidly. We should already be talking about the professions of the future. IT-centered  beekeeping is one of them” says Leu-Severynenko.