Beeswax Production and Marketing in Ethiopia: Challenges in Value Chain

Abstract

Beeswax is one of the most valuable and oldest bee products to be used by mankind and still being used in the development of new products in various fields such as cosmetics, foods, pharmaceuticals, engineering and industry. Ethiopia has huge apicultural resources that made it the leading beeswax producer in Africa, and one of the important beeswax exporter to the world market. In Ethiopia apicultural research is being conducted in a coordinated manner under the national agricultural research system. Hence, a lot of information have been gathered on different aspects of the beekeeping. This work is a review of various research results from published and unpublished data over a long period of time in the area of beeswax production, chemical analysis, marketing and value chain studies in Ethiopia. Despite the country’s huge potential for production of high quality beeswax, only less than 10% of the beeswax produced is exported. The beeswax production and processing practices use traditional and inefficient techniques that leave significant amount of beeswax resource unutilized. The marketing channel for beeswax in the country is also entangled with challenges related to uneasy traceability and adulteration that are affecting both the local and international trade.