The exhibition of honey and beekeeping equipment, in which about forty exhibitors from Montenegro, Serbia and Bosnia and Herzegovina participated, was held today on the city promenade in Pljevlja.
State Secretary in the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Water Management, Stevan Gajević, said that 2.206 beekeepers with a total of 96 beehives are registered in Montenegro.
Gajević said that this year the budget intended for beekeeping was increased from last year's 280 thousand to 355 thousand euros. He believes that this is not enough and that expenditures on this basis should be higher.
"What is not good is the low response of beekeepers to IPARD. In the last five years, we have had only five projects, and these are grants. I invite you to participate in the IPARD project. Two months ago, we started the action of interest-free loans in agriculture. So all registered beekeepers and all registered farmers can get an interest-free loan of 10.000 through the Investment and Development Fund. In the previous period, the government invested over a million euros in the House of Honey, which is one of the most important agricultural projects in Montenegro. You can all buy equipment there at subsidized prices and hand over honey. The goal is to increase the amount of produced honey that can be exported. We have requests from the United Arab Emirates, and some other countries. If I tell you that the retail price of honey in the United Arab Emirates is ten times higher than here, that is enough motivation to carry out that export in a high-quality way. It is a well-known fact that the honey in Montenegro is one of the best in Europe and the world," Gajević said.
Those present were greeted by the President of the Municipality of Pljevlja, Dario Vraneš, and the President of the Association of Beekeeping Organizations in Montenegro, Radule Miljanić.
Miljanić said that the honey exhibition in Pljevlja is one of the most prestigious beekeeping events in Montenegro.
He said that this year was successful for Montenegrin beekeepers.
"For decades, this area has been affirming excellent beekeepers and hard-working hosts who each contribute in their own way to the development and prosperity of beekeeping in Montenegrin agriculture in general.
In the territory of the Pljeval municipality, there are about 300 households engaged in beekeeping, with about 3.500 bee colonies.
Those who exhibited their products yesterday in Pljevlje said that they were satisfied with this year's honey yields, although the beginning of grazing did not indicate this due to frequent rain.
Yesterday, honey was sold at a price of 13 to 15 euros per kilogram.
The beekeeper Mišo Odović, who has been beekeeping with short interruptions for 35 years, says that he is satisfied with this year's yields, which ranged from 13 to 15 kilograms per hive.
In the village of Boščinovići in Pljevlja, he owns an oil farm with about sixty bee colonies that move to Žabljak and Danilovgrad during the grazing season.
According to the organizers, the exhibition is organized with the aim of establishing closer cooperation between beekeepers, beekeeping associations and a more efficient connection between producers and consumers.
The regional exhibition was organized by the Secretariat for the Economy under the auspices of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development.
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