1. Establishing an off-grid solar apiary: An apiary will be established at Centre for Training and Innovation (CTI) to serve as a safe, sustainable home for at least 20 bee colonies. It will also serve as a demonstration facility, provide a healthy sweetener alternative that is more readily available to the public, and a source of income to help sustain apiary operations. CTI currently manages four beehives which will be added to the apiary. Implementation of an off-grid operated apiary will contribute to the ability to provide natura honey at a lower cost and is in line with OEF and CTI?s goal of becoming fully solar operated within the next year to two years.

2. Implementing education and awareness activities: Education and awareness will be increased in several ways. OEF, CTI, and Inter-American Institute for Cooperation on Agriculture (IICA) will host a public workshop to cover beekeeping basics. Additionally, CTI will create, obtain relevant approvals for, and offer an ?Apiology 101? course for more in-depth, advanced learning. For this course, students will learn how to setup, properly take care of and extract honey from hive, They will also contribute a small fee so they have some stake in the project, and they will receive starter beehive kits inclusive of tools and bee boxes. Further, a marketing campaign to increase awareness about the importance of bees, what to do if you have/encounter bees, and how to properly use or reduce pesticides so that they will not negatively affect bee populations will be launched. This will include apiary site tours, and digital fliers and videos that will be share via OEF and CTI?s social media platforms (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram).

3. Provide more affordable honey to the public: This will be done through the purchase and proper use of extraction tools and equipment that will be utilized in an off-grid solar extraction center. This will eliminate a power bill, reduce labor required to extract honey, reduce loss of honey, and keep honeycomb intact so it is quicker and less strenuous for bees to refill and recap. Ultimately, this will contribute to the apiary?s ability to provide honey to the public at a lower cost.

This project is relevant to:

1. SGP OP6 Component 1: Community Landscape and Seascape Conservation ? protecting and/or growing bee populations contributes to the protection and/or growth and subsequently mitigates loss of biodiversity as bees are responsible for pollinating one-third of food crops and 90 per cent of wild plants.

2. SGP OP6 Component 3: Low Carbon Energy Access Co-benefits ? implementing the use of solar technology reduces the need for and use of fossil fuel-based energy.