Selling cliff-bee honey to pay teachers’ salary

By Thakur Prasad Acharya,Myagdi, June 7: Ward No. 8 of Raghuganga Rural Municipality, in Myagdi district, has been selling honey collected from hives on cliffs to pay the salaries of the teachers of Ritung Secondary School.

The ward office opens a tender for honey collection every year. Recently, Chitra Chhantyal, Nir Prasad Chhantyal and Tek Bahadur were permitted to collect honey from the hives across the ward for two years.

“The collected money is used to pay the salaries of four teachers of Ritung Secondary School employed under the private source,” said Agendra Chhantyal, a ward member.

Chhantyal informed that the ward office has been selling cliff honey to pay the teachers for the past five years.

“The school had no other source of money so we decided to sell the honey,” said Chhantyal.

The youth of the village have also been earning a decent income by hunting honey.

“Cliff honey is sold at Rs. 2,000 per litre. The hunting has helped many support their families economically over the year,” said Ankit Pun, a local youth.

However, the profit from the cliff honey is decreasing.

“Earlier, Rs. 800,000 to one million used to be collected annually. However, there is currently a dearth of cliff honey hunters, so the bidding for honey hunting this year was reduced to Rs. 300,000,” said Chhantyal.

The reason behind the decline is said to be a lack of motivation in the village youths to embrace the hunting profession, which is seen as a job of the brave.

“Thanks to some youths, who had learned the skill of hunting from their ancestors, we have been able to hunt honey for now. The new generation is not attracted towards this profession,” said Chhantyal.

“Hanging with the support of some ropes along a deadly cliff to fight with deadly honey bees and collect honey from their hives is more difficult than it sounds. It is not called the job of the brave for nothing – it is called so for a reason,” said Nir Prasad, a honey hunter.

According to the hunters, honey hunting used to be a major profession in the rural areas of Myagdi district including Gurja, Malkabang, Lulang, Niskot, Kuinemangal, Chimola, Shikh and Histan among others.

The peak season for honey hunting in the region is from mid-May to mid-July. The collected honey is refined collectively before selling it, with some amount distributed to all the villagers. 

Demand for cliff honey is good as it is sweet and has medicinal properties.