CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
1.1. BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY
Agriculture provides primary means of employment for Nigerians, accounts for more than one-third of total gross domestic product (GDP), ensures food security, alleviate poverty and reduce labour force wastage (FAO, 2014; World Bank, 2014; Amaza and Maurice, 2005). The agricultural share of the GDP stood at about 90% before independence in 1960, decreased to 56% between 1960 – 1969 and collapsed to about 40% since 2013 (CBN, 2014). Furthermore, the contribution of agriculture to the GDP further declined to 35 percent between 2002 – 2004 (Amaza and Maurice, 2005). The decline in the contribution of agriculture to the country’s GDP overtime is due to its dwindling relevance relative to other sectors of economy, especially the commercial exploration of petroleum (CBN, 2014). This condition leads to poor agricultural output in general and consequently, impoverishment of the people that are agriculture dependent. The search for sustainable forms of farming which will be complementary and also improves the biodiversity, therefore, becomes imperative. Beekeeping is an applied science of rearing honey bees for man’s economic benefits, is also the mother source of honey production. The common African honeybee (Apis Mellifera Adansonni), live throughout the year in colonies consisting of a queen or mother bee, which is a fertile egg-laying female 10,000 to 200,000 worker bees called drones that may be present in the colony only during the reproductive season. Honey bees naturally build .their nests in a hole of a tree, inside a cave and under the roof of buildings, but traditionally, people also keep bee colonies, beekeeping has been in practice in many part of the world (Alberg, 2004). The main reason for keeping bees by farmers is to extract the honey they produce. The honey has been used for dressing the wounds, as anti-diarrhoea drug, in alcoholic drink, tobacco curing, bakery and confectionery and in manufacturing of cosmetics.
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