Once upon a time in H-FARM Campus, fifteen year old H-FARM student, Emilie Piovesana, received the “Dr. Siva Kumari MYP Student Innovators’ Grant”, the IB recognition reserved for the most innovative projects with a high social impact carried out by students from over 5500 IB schools around the world.
This happy ending honeybee story shows how we can become better custodians of our honey bee colonies and make use of their resources in ways that enrich the entire ecosystem and living entities.
The B-Farm initiative was created with the aim of supporting the environment and educating people on apiculture, a necessary practice to ensure bees survival as well as countryside flower species and crops. In fact, more than 80% of the foods we consume everyday depend on bees: avocados, bananas, almonds, vanilla and many others. Bees also pollinate around 80% of wildflowers in Europe, making an enormous contribution to our beautiful countryside landscapes.
At only 15 years old Emelie created a real business plan, built a beehive and, with the support of a local beekeeper, she populated and cared for it. She created a website and through crowdfunding, collected funds to cover the costs. Donators can support the project by adopting a bee, giving it a name and buying the delicious honey jars produced.
What’s next?
Emelie’s next step will be to turn this local project into a replicable and scalable project so that other IB schools can follow in her footsteps by building and developing their own hives!
