Low yield turns bitter pill for Sohra’s orange honey

Sohra (Cherrapunjee): The land of mists and mellow fruitfulness is also home to the ‘orange’ or ‘orange blossom’ honey; an item highly sought after by connoisseurs of organic products.
Tourists visiting Sohra hardly ever return without a bottle of the premium product. It is not uncommon to find women selling the deep amber liquid in jars and bottles, along with packets of bay leaf and fragrant cinnamon sticks, near tourist spots in Sohra civil subdivision.The future of orange honey, however, remains uncertain unless the state government and marketing agencies work together to increase its production.
Cherrapunjee’s orange honey is derived from bees that feed on nectar from orange flowers. Produced in areas like Nongsteng, Mawphu and Umblai, it comes chiefly from orchards of Khasi mandarin in the Ri-War area of East Khasi Hills that overlooks the plains of Bangladesh. The product is considered to be organic as the bees are not fed any additional food like sugar.
“Low production is one of the reasons Sohra’s orange honey has been limited to local markets. Production of honey is also tied up with the cultivation of oranges,” said S Bhattacharjee, former managing director of North Eastern Regional Agricultural Marketing Corporation Limited (Neramac), which works under the Union DoNER ministry.
As a result, producers of orange honey in Sohra are completely dependent on local markets — the lewbah (held every eighth day) and the lewrit (held every fourth day) — and pockets of Shillong like Bara Bazar and Laitumkhrah to sell their stock.
It is believed orange honey has medicinal properties. It prevents cough and throat irritation, heart diseases and heals wounds and burns. Khasi legends, too, testify to the importance of orange honey in local culture. It is believed that corpses, especially of the ‘syiems’ (king/chieftains), would be embalmed with orange honey when the soil in Sohra would be too wet for burial rituals.
While the Khasi mandarin recently got a Geographical Indication (GI)-tag, which attests to its production in a particular region, the orange honey has no such authentication mark or certificate. “There is a huge market for the honey, but supply is very limited. Hence, it will be difficult to lobby for a GI tag or similar markers for it,” Bhattacharjee said.
The premium variety of organic honey can cost up to Rs 1,000 per kilo. Other varieties cost around Rs 500-600 per kilo. In spite of rising demand, most state and Centre-run emporiums do not sell the product.
“We do not stock orange honey. Production is too low,” said B Sawkmie, deputy store in-charge of the Centre-run Purbashree in Shillong’s Police Bazaar.
One of main reasons for the low yield of orange honey in Sohra is the use of pesticides in orange orchards as they are detrimental to bees. “The Centre’s schemes for horticulture were mainly pesticide-driven. Now, the government is realizing the need for organic farming. Once orange farms become organic, production of honey, too, will increase,” explained Daniel Ingti, former director of the state directorate of horticulture.
Secondly, with many orange growers choosing to buy the cheaper, non-local saplings of the plant, the distinctive flavour of Sohra’s orange honey is fast disappearing. Lack of cooperatives in this sector is also hurting honey production. There are only four cooperatives in Sohra that are involved in its production.
“A cooperative requires at least 15 members. In Sohra, it is difficult for us to get orange growers together. They don’t think alike,” said J C Paul, sub-registrar of cooperative society, Sohra. The state department of cooperation, along with the Khadi and Village Industries Board of Meghalaya, has been involved in small-scale interventions in the orange honey processing sector.
To translate small victories into a bigger boost for the apiculture industry, the Centre’s Mission Organic, which was recently launched in the state, is critical. Equally important, is the role of the apiculture mission, one of the nine missions of the Meghalaya Basin Development Authority that implements the Integrated Basin Development and Livelihood Programme (IBDLP).
Under the programme, the state recently inaugurated two apiculture missions — one for the Khasi and Jaintia Hills and the other for the Garo Hills — which will work in tandem with the department of commerce and industries.
Training sessions for beekeepers, distribution of bee kits among local entrepreneurs and dissemination of information of improved beekeeping practices are some of the ways in which the apiculture mission hopes to give a fillip to the fledgling sector and help promote a product that is as much a part of Cherrapunjee’s allure as are its mists and rain.
Amava Bhattacharya