Bee happy, farmers creating sweet buzz during pandemic

One of the positive outcomes of the pandemic is the way how local farming is thriving and giving the local products a double-digit growth as farmers are getting time to spend with their farming activities over the months. There has been 9.8 per cent increase in the activities related to agriculture and fishery sectors during the pandemic and the volume reached RO 571 million. At the end of September 2019, it was RO 520.1 million, according to a data released by the National Centre for Statistics and Information (NCSI). Various crops and other farming activities like, honey beekeeping, is certainly a cash crop for Omani farmers. Bees are grown in modern square boxes which are more popular for their efficiency while bee colonies are maintained by many locals. LUCRATIVE BUSINESS Abdurahiman al Nabhani, an apiarist who keeps large number of honeybees on his farm in Dakhiliyah Governorate, is busy nurturing and tapping the honey for both domestic as well as commercial purposes. He gets at least 30 to 40 kilos of natural honey a month from the beehives that adorn the farm. “Beekeeping has been thriving in our locality and a large number of farmers found it greatly lucrative and added more beehives to their existing collections. It’s truly a cash crop at the least investments’’, Al Nabhani, who owns his farms in wilayat Imti, told the Observer. There are two main types of honey in Oman which have got local and international markets alike. Named Sidr and Smer after the trees that offer their precious nectar, they are high in demand. Samr is dark in colour and thick. Samr is harvested in summer, whereas Sidr is harvested in winter and is light in both colour and flavour.