Heights beekeeping a sweet plan

At this moment, help is coming to impoverished families across Northern Pakistan, allowing the women and men of these families to provide a sustainable income and send their children to a good school in hope of a brighter future. All of this is possible because of honey.

The Hashoo Foundation’s beekeeping project, Plan Bee, provides people living in Gilgit, Hunza-Negar, Ghizer, Chitral and Kalash Valley with the tools and knowledge of how to maintain and harvest their own honey that can be sold through the foundation on the Pakistani market.

Plan Bee was originally established to remedy the imbalance of male dominance in communities in Pakistan. Female beekeepers selling their honey door-to-door had to sell their product at 35 percent less than the men selling the same quality and variety.

Plan Bee, sets up several bee hives for each woman and provides the beekeeping equipment and classes. All that is asked in return is that the mothers send their children to schools free of extremist and fundamentalist influences.

The foundation is hoping to help create a new generation of entrepreneurs, a generation who have seen the success of their parents and have unbiased opinions.

As of this year, the foundation has more than 600 female beekeepers managing more than 1,700 hives and more than 1,000 children enrolled in school. A beekeeper with three hives can produce 54 kilograms, which can be sold for up to $216; this money is now being used to improve the quality of life for these women and their families.

This year Hashoo invites Houstonians to the Plan Bee Art Exhibit fund raiser at America’s restaurant in the River Oaks area where artwork from various female artists from around the world will be on display and for sale.

Each hive costs $106, which will be the base price of each piece of art — the foundation wants to raise enough money to provide at least 100 women with 300 hives.

Along with the donations of art, Chef David Cordúa will be preparing a menu of honey-based Pakistani cuisine to provide a taste of the honey harvested by the Pakistani women of Plan Bee to all attendees.

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