Fabricius Kristiansen, Lotta
- Department of People and Society, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
Abstract
The key to achieving sustainable beekeeping in Europe is the application of Best Beekeeping Practices, adapted to different climatic and environmental conditions, bee genetics, beekeeping equipment, and diseases. A bottom-up survey was developed by the Horizon EU project named "B-THENET," a Thematic Network based on a Multi-Actor Approach to identify for the first time what practices are perceived as most relevant by EU beekeepers, and to investigate beekeepers' preferred means of communication. A total of 2094 answers from beekeepers in 22 Member States were collected. Beekeepers deemed the most relevant practices to "Properly place hives in the apiary" and to "Guarantee best efficacy of anti-Varroa treatments, especially with organic compounds." The preferred communication means were visual materials. Building on these results, a list of 23 Best Beekeeping Practices will be developed in 13 EU languages and will be placed in the repository platform of the project B-THENET, to support the training of beekeepers.
Keywords
Best beekeeping practices; European beekeeping; B-THENET; honey bee management; Apis mellifera
Published in
Journal of Apicultural Research
2025
Publisher: TAYLOR AND FRANCIS LTD
SLU Authors
UKÄ Subject classification
Other Social Sciences not elsewhere specified
Ecology
Publication identifier
- DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/00218839.2025.2576979
Permanent link to this page (URI)
https://res.slu.se/id/publ/144791