TEHRAN- The production of honey in North Khorasan province, in the northeast of Iran, rose 11 percent in the first 11 months of the current Iranian calendar year (March 21, 2022-February 19, 2023), as compared to the same period of time in the past year, a provincial official announced.

Alireza Sadeq, the director of poultry affairs of the province’s Agriculture Department, said that 3,179 tons of honey were produced from the bee colonies of the province in 11 months of this year.

“According to statistics, we have 2,282 apiaries in the province, which is 2.4 percent of the total number of apiaries in the country”, the official stated.

As stated by the chairman of the Animal Science Research Institute of Iran (ASRI), Iran ranks third in the world in the number of apiaries.

Mokhtar Mohajer also said that Iran's rank in honey production is changing and moving between fourth and sixth place in the world.

Based on the data released by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), Iran is the third-largest producer of honey in the world.

The chairman of the Animal Science Research Institute has said that the amount of honey production in the country should be increased by three to four kilograms per colony.

Mohajer said, “According to the Seventh National Development Plan (2022-2026), the amount of honey production should be increased by at least three to four kilograms per colony according to the diversity of plants and the area of pastures that we have in the country”.

He announced that 112,000 tons of honey, 8,300 kilograms of royal jelly, 406 tons of pollen, 2,536 tons of beeswax, 247 tons of propolis, and 3,917 grams of bee venom are produced annually in the country.

Currently, there are about 11.8 million bee colonies in 109,759 apiaries in the country, he added.

Pointing out that Iran ranks third in the world in the number of apiaries, he said 87,932 people are working in apiaries in the country, and the output of these apiaries is honey and its by-products.

Stating that all these products are not consumed domestically, he said about 10 percent of these products are exported to countries such as Turkey and Arab countries.

Complaining about the low amount of honey production compared to the number of apiaries and colonies, Mohajer said the average production of honey in Iran is much lower than the standard, in a way that about four kilograms of honey is produced in traditional colonies, and an average of 9.6 kilograms of honey is produced in modern colonies.

He stated that the low literacy of the producers is one of the main reasons for the low production in the colonies, adding that the production potential of each bee colony in the country is more than 25 kilograms.

MA/MA