Blackburne House Group's ambitious BEE YOU Project aims to educate and up-skill young people in entrepreneurial activities and the ancient art of Beekeeping. We want to engage with 600 young people aged between 17-24 over the course of five years to have an impact on the green economy; while positively influencing the decline of the local Honeybee population. The young people will undertake a 15-week programme (one day per week) of both theoretical and practical Bee Keeper training to ensure they are able to sustain the livestock, gaining additional skills around Hive making, research into bee habitats & environmental impact, honey extraction, product making, taking products to market and enterprise development.

 

It is expected that 600 newly trained Beekeepers with mentoring support will be responsible for the support of 200 hives in developed green spaces in Merseyside. In turn, we hope that this will introduce an additional 14million honey bees to the area and allow for the production and sale of approximately 6,000 pounds of local honey and associated products.

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The BEE YOU project is part of Our Bright Future, a £33 million programme funded by the Big Lottery Fund and run by a consortium of eight organisations which is led by The Wildlife Trusts.

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Our Bright Future aims to tackle three big challenges facing society today- a lack of social cohesion, a lack of opportunities for young people and vulnerability to climate change. 31 youth-led projects across the UK are each receiving around £1m of funding to give young people the skills and knowledge to improve their local environments- from reducing marine pollution to minimising food waste.

 

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