Images via Nathan Wiley & Alexei Hay
Guerlain has teamed up with the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) for a project called “Women for Bees.” The state-of-the-art, female beekeeping entrepreneurship programme will support female beekeepers hailing from various countries like Russia, Ethiopia and Cambodia. And Angelina Jolie will be acting as the Godmother of the 2021 promotion of beekeepers, who will be able to establish their own beekeeping operations whilst participating in a vital, socially beneficial scheme.
Image via Nathan Wiley
The empowering initiative, led with the help of the French Observatory of Apidology (OFA), will take place in the organisation’s Biosphere Reserves, located in Provence’s Massif de la Sainte-Baume.
Image via Nathan Wiley
Due to be set in motion on June 21, the 30-day training scheme will welcome 50 women over the next five years. Each year, participants from five different UNESCO biosphere reserves will acquire the theoretical and practical bases of the various aspects of beekeeping, including the running of a professional apiary, thanks to the OFA beekeepers’ expertise. By emboldening women through expertise-driven and sustainable professional activity, they will be equipped with all the protocols that let them sustain their bee colonies and become fully professional beekeeper-entrepreneurs. Additionally, the women will be members of an international network of female beekeepers and can help train others by sharing their skills and knowledge.
“When women gain skills and knowledge their instinct is to help raise others. I’m excited to meet the women taking part in this programme from all over the world,” Jolie, a Guerlain brand ambassador, said.“ I look forward to getting to know them and learning about their culture and environment and the role bees play in that. I hope the training will strengthen their independence, their livelihoods and their communities.”
Image via Nathan Wiley
Fast Fact: By 2025, 2,500 hives will have been built within 25 UNESCO Biosphere Reserves and 125 million bees will have been restocked.
