More than 100 Rwandan beekeepers are sustainably earning from beeswax production working with a firm known as Bee Light Rwanda which sources their output for production of consumables. 

While Honey is one of the most consumed products in Rwanda, many people, especially beekeepers, don’t recognize the use of beeswax, which is obtained after the honey is removed from hives. 

Local beekeeper Emmanuel Bucyana, currently working with Bee Light Rwanda, spoke with Doing Business and shared his experience.

"As a beekeeper, I didn’t recognize that beeswax can also be a useful material apart from honey produced by bees,” he said. 

Bucyana grew up in a family of beekeepers, and he grew up doing it as well. He loved Honey and sold it, but he didn’t know the fact that beeswax can benefit him in different ways, that was until he got to know Bee Light Rwanda and learned more about bees, honey, beeswax, and how one can "bee kind” to those incredible creatures. 

"We provide different workshops for beekeepers from different parts of Rwanda and teach them how they can take more care of their bees and benefit as well,” said Madhumita Chandra, the creative director at Bee Light Rwanda.

Candles made from bee wax.

Bee Light Rwanda is a Rwandan-based company started by Belgian expat in 2017. After she got to know many beekeepers in Rwanda, she couldn’t see any beeswax products on the market. She then decided to use beeswax and create locally handmade products.

That’s when Bee Light started to manufacture different products from beeswax, including candles, Beeswax picnic bags, beeswax wraps, and many more.

After starting, Bee Light reached out to bee farmers’ cooperatives and other individual beekeepers across the country. According to Chandra, bee farmers didn’t use beeswax at all.  

"After the research we did, we found that all the beeswax was thrown away since the farmers didn’t know its usefulness,” said Chandra. That made Bee Light start providing workshops and different courses to the bee farmers, teaching them more about the bees and beeswax, as she added.

Creative Director of Bee Light, Madhumita Chandra, poses in front of candles created using beeswax at her shop in Kigali on Monday. / Craish Bahizi

Bee Light Rwanda also hosts different experts in beekeeping from all around the world each year. This is aimed at providing helpful workshops to beekeepers in Rwanda, through which they learn more on beekeeping and how they can increase their production. 

"The experts gave them proper training and taught them modern techniques on how to increase honey production and beeswax production,” said Chandra

This comes as one of several avenues to increase honey production in Rwanda. In the past years, there have been many factors hindering honey production, like the use of pesticides in farming, traditional beekeeping techniques, and drought that continued to hurt honey production across the country, as a study has shown.

With this in place and many more, the production of honey and honey-related products in Rwanda projects a rise. Though figures show that honey production decreased from about 5,000 tonnes in 2016 to 3,500 tonnes in 2017, while there is a target to increase the production to 9,000 tonnes per year by 2024.

In addition to working with beekeepers, Bee Light Rwanda also works with other different producer groups around Rwanda like Paul horn company, Umutako company, and many others.

Naomie Dusabimana, an artisan from Kicukiro, spoke to Doing Business and shared her experience as well. "I learned a lot of skills and got to know more about bees, now I can make candles and other handicrafts, and now I make a living. It’s a great opportunity,” said Dusabimana

Asked about the difference between products made from beeswax and other products people are used to, especially candles, Chandra said that the beeswax products are environmentally friendly and natural.

Dusabimana Naomie an Artisan working on Beeswax products

"They have health benefits as they have a honey aroma since they retain the soft honey scent. In contrast, other candles are made in paraffin wax, affecting the respiratory system,” he said.

"In 5 years, Bee Light would like to expand its presence to different parts of Africa and the world, catering to audiences everywhere with these top-quality handcrafted Made-in-Rwanda products,” said Chandra. They would like to represent Rwanda’s growth and development and its handicrafts and local talent, as Chandra added.

Rwanda expects to produce 8 611 metric tonnes of honey by 2023/24, according to official projects released in March of this year. There are over 120,000 beekeepers in the country, according to RAB data, but only 35% of them practice modern beekeeping techniques.

"The Rwandan beekeeping industry has advanced significantly in the previous 20 years, although production is still primarily based on traditional methods,” the Food and Agriculture Organisation reported in February.

Honey is such an essential product not only worldwide but also in Rwanda. Honey is used in cosmetics products, a bread jam, treatment of burns, daily hygiene, and skin health. In Honey, production of beeswax is also obtained, which is used to manufacture different products like candles, lip balms, hand creams, and other products.