When you come across a honeybee, You will be scared before you can think of the honey. This is a wasp, this is not a bee. But can you imagine Beekeeping can be a career option? You can pursue it as a job. The easiest job for a farmer is Beekeeping. How?
Come, let’s find out. I’m in Slovenia now. A small country between Austria and Italy. Known as the No. 1 country in the World, For beekeeping. 60% of Slovenian land is covered with green lush forests. About 50km from the capital Ljubljana, the village of Begunja, Is home to about 100 people, millions of bees, and Erik Luznar. Interestingly, the Solvenians love their bees more than the honey.
To understand more about this job, Come let’s talk to One of the most famous and the youngest beekeeper in Slovenia, Erik Luznar. -Hi, Erik. -Hello. This isn’t Fear Factors, But I want to show how You can seriously consider it as a career choice By getting over your fear. This is something like an incense stick. They claim that the smoke helps to calm down the bees.
And once the bees calm down they won’t sting as much. Come, let’s open this hive. This is actually a special hive. I call it Book Hive. Because it opens like a Book. And you can read about the life of the bees. Like a book. These are dead bees here? Yes, they’re dead. -Is it normal? A few dying every day? -Yeah, yeah. -I will just start opening from this side. -Mhm. Absolutely crazy.
Yeah, and the majority of the bees are inside the hive. Because we’re in the middle of September And there’s nothing to find actually in nature. There’s no honey, no nectar. Now they are forging some water and some pollen. And that’s it. -They’re already preparing for winter. -Okay. You know, if you feel confident, you can also touch them. Just try! It's...it’s not that dangerous. This is the drone, that’s the drone, that a drone.
And all the others are bee workers, And there is only one bee queen. The drones, these are bee males, They have no stingers. Let’s see if I can show you. No, they can’t sting you. They don’t have stingers actually. Basically, there are 3 types of members in a bee family. The Workers, who work, The male bees, known as Drones, they are slightly bigger in size, But they do not have stings, as Erik showed. And then is the Queen Bee. In a colony of 20,000-30,000 bees, There is only 1 Queen Bee in the colony. And about 300-400 male bees.
Now, I will intentionally get stung by a bee, To show you that it isn’t quite deadly. We’ll do this intentionally. By placing the Worker Bee on my hand, where she’ll sting me. -Are you ready? -Yeah. Okay, this is how the... -I just press her body... -It’s…it’s… -...and she... -okay, take it out. -just put her stinger in you. -No, take it out now. Oh. It’s not that bad, you are a big boy. This is… -Can you take it out now? -Yeah. And when you get stung, You have to remove the stinger as soon as possible.
Because the venom will still go into the body for like 5-10 minutes if the stinger is in the body like this. -You are getting more and more poison, -Yeah. But you will not feel it at all in a few minutes. Friends, as you can see, I’m perfectly alright. -So you wanna try it another time? -No. When she stung me, it was very painful. But I’ll say that the pain was a 5 On a pain scale of 0-10.
Now, it’s not hurting at all. But there’s just a small mark here, and the area is a bit red. I'll be fine. Slovenia is the only country in the European Union To have protected their native bee species. The Carniolan Bee species, The bees that you saw, Are very friendly. Normally, you don’t need to wear big suits to be protected from them, right? Yeah, that’s true, Because our Slovenian Carniolan Honey Bees, Are not aggressive, they’re really calm. Of course, they sting you, they have a stinger, But in comparison to other species, They don’t sting you.
There are some days, when the bees are more aggressive. Or maybe, if you do something they don’t like. In this case, you can also wear this. You can just open a hive and start checking the bees. This top part is known as a Veil. Normally, there’s a full-bodysuit, But today, I’ve put on the veil, just to show it to you. Honey is the bee’s food.
And to collect that, the bees And the beekeeper has to work very hard. Bees have different needs each season. This is why beekeepers have to be attentive always. So this is food here, And there are broods, eggs, larvae, and pupae. If something is not okay in there, how do we know that? Well, if you don’t find any honey, That means that they are starving. If they are starving now, they need to make honey immediately. It’s not enough if I just plant some flowers. No, you have to give them some extra food, extra sugar.
Beekeepers collect the honey made by the bees, It’s so difficult to care for a single animal, And there are hundreds of thousands of honey bees here. Just imagine it friends. How huge this responsibility is. But it’s not difficult to understand it. If I don’t find any brood, any eggs, any larvae, Then it means that there is no queen inside. And in this case, I have to put in another queen. These small wooden boxes are homes to these bees. They have a hive inside these.
Filled with the sweet honey. These painted boxes Are special to the Slovenian identity. In each box, there can be 5,000-20,000 honey bees. And each box can produce up to 20 kg of honey in a good season. This is honey. Mm, It’s very tasty. Even in Slovenia, honey bees do not get sufficient food during the winters. That’s why they need to be given additional nutrients. In this aspect, the Indian climate is much better for the honey bees, Especially in North India.
Although honey has been used in India since the Vedic era, There are very few professional beekeepers in India. In the Prime Minister’s Economic Advisory Council, The Beekeeping Development Committee, Published a report last year, Stating that, presently, in India, there are around 3.4 million bee colonies. But there’s the potential to have 200 million bee colonies. So you can see how much the country needs this profession. Approximately, as per the registered data, There are around 9,000 registered beekeepers in India.
But compare it to Slovenia, Where the total population is 2 million people, It has about 11,000 beekeepers. Just imagine the potential in India. Only in the last few years, People have started paying attention to beekeeping. The Agriculture Universities in India, Have played a major role in preparing people for this profession.
How did you take up this profession? Like, what made you choose this profession? I started with totally different things. Not the bees. The bees were not interesting to me. What did you study? After completing your school? -A Master’s degree in Journalism. -Journalism? So you’re doing nothing related to journalism now? No, nothing.
And then after the study, I just decided to become a professional beekeeper. Actually, I’m the fourth generation of beekeepers in the family. So it's kinda long tradition, it looks like I didn't have any other choice than becoming a beekeeper myself. Friends, after training for some days, You too can start this. Like this farmer from Bihar’s Banka district. Ripusudan Singh, Started beekeeping some years ago. People ask about how much they need to invest in this. And how successful can this be. Can you provide us with some estimates? How easy is this for a farmer? The easiest work for a farmer is beekeeping.
If you think about it, there’s no limit to the timing, You don’t have to work on it for a fixed number of hours each day. Here, the Bihar government is promoting beekeeping. There’s a 90% subsidy for each box. The box is priced at ₹4,000, So that costs about ₹400 after a subsidy of ₹3,600. So each box costs about ₹400. Yeah, it costs ₹400 for us. But if there’s any support from the Central government, It becomes totally free. Even a 10% subsidy to the Scheduled Tribe, makes it absolutely free.
And beekeeping isn’t a difficult task. All you need to do is to keep track of them timely, every week, And you need to pay attention to the flowers you can grow for them. We take the bees to mustard fields. We bring the boxes to the mustard fields, This allows us to harvest honey weekly. Each week, each box produces about 1kg of honey. So suppose we have 200 boxes, We can produce about 2 quintals each week. Provided that there are lots of flowers in the area.
How much can you earn by selling the honey? Suppose you have a minimum of 50 boxes, You can produce around 2 quintals monthly. So you can expect around ₹50,000-₹60,000 monthly. And how much land would one need to have 50 boxes? See, there’s no particular need for land. You can have it on the roadside as well. As long as there’re fields nearby. You can place the boxes, on the boundary around fields as well. So it is important to have fields and flowers around. Yes, that’s necessary.
If there are no flowers, how will they survive? That’s true. Another thing is that it requires some transporting. Every 1-2 months, you need to transport it. Like we are at mustard fields now, Once the mustard season is over, The mango flowers will bloom, Or the seesam or something else. And we have a Lichi orchard about 100 km from here, So we divert the bees to the lichi orchard. You need to transport them in this. This is part of the hive, When the bees live in this and travel, the production increases. Beekeeping is a job that is much needed for our environment. Because the food systems all around the world survives with the help of the bees.
The agriculture survives. Without the bees, humans won’t survive. Our fruits, plants, and vegetables, Need pollination to grow. And bees help in this pollination. In fact, one-third of food production in the world, Depends on the bees. They are so important. So, Erik, I want to go into the 'Why' of this job. What is something that you truly love about your job? I like the fact that nobody commands me what to do. That I’m my own boss. And of course, what attracts me to this job is This is my office. The nature is my office.
And working with the bees is something really unique. Because they’re very grateful. And when you have them, You can actually feel that They’re very thankful for what you’re doing for them. Are there some challenges you face Or something you dislike about this job? Yes, of course. There are many challenges. Especially the bad weather. You know, because you never know what to expect.
There are sudden storms, bad weather, lots of rain, There are pesticides and hybrids. What do you do about pesticides? Well, not much. There’s not much that you can do. I just try to hide the bees Away from pesticides. And nowadays when you see the current situation of the world. Where the bees are disappearing fast, You also see some... Do you feel more passionate or relevant That you are helping the nature and the environment as well? The bees lived here on this planet millions of years before the humans came.
And they became jeopardised in the last few years. So the only fault is of humans. We did it. We jeopardised them. And now we’re trying to save them. And you’re one of the saviours. If you are a beekeeper, you are almost a hero in that sense. Well, I’m trying to help them. I help them, and they help me. So we try to cooperate. 20th May is celebrated as World Bee Day. Slovenia is credited for that.
They requested this at the United Nations. In fact, the father of modern beekeeping, The one who started the culture of beekeeping, Hailed from Slovenia. Anton Janša. So would you recommend this to anyone who is passionate about the environment, and wants to live in nature and doesn’t want to work in a 9-to-5 day job in an office? Would you recommend this job to such a person? Well, I think they should think twice.
Because beekeeping it’s a lot of hard work. If they want to be a beekeeper. If they’re prepared to learn, from bees and about bees, Then it's definitely for them? Of course, there’s something for them. You start with 1 colony, 2 and then 3, And then if you find out that this is something that you can do, for a living, Then you can just multiply the colonies. So you’re saying that you can start it as a hobby and then if it’s suitable, expand.
Yes, that is what I would suggest. -That's a good suggestion. This profession has everything that you can find in another job or career. That’s why I request the parents watching this video, Don’t force your children to become engineers, doctors, or government officials.
They’ll get everything in these jobs that they could get in conventional jobs. And they’ll earn the respect of society. You saw Erik, a professional beekeeper, How well respected he is, He is renowned for beekeeping. In Slovenia, you can simply use his name to reach his place. You won’t face any trouble getting his address when you come here. Friends, this was Slovenia. The Land of Beekeepers. With another interesting job and career. Thank you very much!