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Rahul Preeth
Doha
At a sprawling farm in Al Shahaniya around 30 kilometres west of Doha, Khalid M Suwaidi pumped some smoke from a steel contraption into a wooden box. Protected by a brown coverall complete with a hat and a netted-face mask, he removed the top of the box and carefully pulled out a wooden frame.
It held something that is crucial to Qatar's goal of fortifying its food security ” a colony of honeybees.
Suwaidi is the country's largest beekeeper and owns the Bu Saif Apiaries that has more than 1,000 hives installed across the country. Ever since Qatar came under an unjust siege imposed by Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Bahrain and Egypt, Suwaidi has been on a mission.
"I want Qatar to become an exporter of honey from being an importer," the 41-year-old said, reminding that his pursuit was indirectly helping the country's agricultural sector, which is aiming to be self-reliable in a few years.
"Beekeeping, on an industrial scale, is central to Qatar's agriculture," he said."Fruits like Sidr that you see across the country won't be here if there are no bees to carry out the pollination."
With long spells of extremely hot summer and limited vegetation, Qatar is not the first choice for anyone wanting to set up an apiary. Bees do not usually work when the temperature is too high and produce less honey if they have to fly a long distance to collect nectar. Overexposed, the bees can even die of exhaustion.
But Suwaidi said he has figured out ways to beat the Qatari heat throughout his more-than-a-decade-long experience in this field.
"I use a combination of different techniques. All of my hives are strategically placed in locations that afford the bees enough shade, water and vegetation. That is why our hives are scattered all over the country," he said.
Bees will fly two miles in any direction for nectar, he said, but the honey production increases if nectar is closer."So, finding the right spot is important and that skill comes with a deeper understanding of the country's geography and the bees' behaviour," Suwaidi said.
Honeybees became a fascination for Suwaidi when he was a kid. Although, he cannot place exactly how they piqued his interests (nobody in his immediate or extended family is into this business), he said he has always wanted to become a beekeeper.
"I guess the passion for beekeeping was born with me. I had my first close encounter with the bees when I was six years old."
In the following years since then, whenever he went abroad on trips, Suwaidi made sure the destination had an apiary. Having travelled across Europe and most of Asia to see how bees are reared in each of those places, Suwaidi decided to turn his passion into a business in 2005.
That year, Suwaidi flew in a few boxes of bees from Egypt and set up the hives at his home."I gave away all the honey from the first harvest to my friends and family. They were extremely impressed by its quality and taste, which led me to launch it into a full-fledged business," he said.
"When I began the business, the market was flooded with imported honey, particularly from Yemen. Gradually, we have carved a space for ourselves in the market."
Suwaidi harvests up to 15 tonnes of honey a year from his apiaries in Qatar and aims to ramp up the production to around 30 tonnes within the next two years.
According to him, there is overwhelming demand in the local market for his honey, which has led him to reject an import offer from France.
"Eventually, yes, I want to take my 'made-in-Qatar' brand of honey across the world. But currently, my focus is on the local market, not because of commercial interests but due to nationalistic sentiments," he said.
Known for the quality of its honey, the Bu Saif Apiaries have represented Qatar in several international expositions, including the prestigious Apimondia International Apicultural Congress. The biennial event is held in a different country every two years and requires participants to subject their honey to numerous quality tests.
Besides, Suwaidi's establishment was picked as the second-best idea for a productive family project by the Ministry of Economy and Commerce in 2013 and the best honey project in all of GCC in 2015.
Today, the Bu Saif apiaries have diversified its operation into two more areas besides harvesting honey ” a facility that offers aspiring beekeepers training and assistance to set up apiaries in Qatar and the Bu Saif Apiaries Caf` in Souq Wakif that serves confectioneries which use only honey as the sweetening agent.
