Testimonies of a beekeeper. How easy it is to export honey to the European Union?

His grandfather had some hives, but he did not imagine he would become a beekeeperand even to take care of the export of honey abroad.

Nicanor Negru, a 29-year-old man from Costesti village, Ialoveni district, a graduate of the Academy of Economic Studies of Moldova, started his honey business in April 2014.

Everything started with 100 hives

Everything started with 100 bee families that Nicanor bought from a beekeeper after a friend proposed to join forces and develop the business which he began earlier. Thus the company “Regina Naturii” was born and turned into one of the most famous apicultural companies in the last years, whereas our hero became its general manager, thanks to his studies at ASEM.
He made some calculations and drawn a business plan, but by virtue of his youth, the initial calculations were too optimistic. Nicanor says that on paper the profit was much more beautiful than in reality.

At the beginning he had experienced many obstacles and even losses. The investments made in the apiaries were not yet recovered, but he was already was hopping to make the first profit the same year. With those 100 hives, the fresh beekeeper has managed to reach 500 and decided not to stop there, but focus mainly on another type of activity.

The beekeepers understood that in order to be able to export, they need to associate

Initially, the plan was to deal only with beekeeping, but at one point, Nicanor and his business partner concluded that they could obtain a better profit if they process and export honey. However, as the separate export of only their own honey did not look to be a profitable business, the two entrepreneurs decided to associate. It happened one year after Nicanor's entry into the honey business.

"In 2015 we concluded that there is enough potential in the village and in our region to establish a collaboration with other beekeepers to achieve better results. Therefore, we set up a group of beekeepers to export by common agreement our honey to European Union, where, as we found out, there is a constant demand for honey and, moreover, there are no quotas, according to the provisions of the Free Trade Agreement between the Republic of Moldova and the European Union, that would limit the quantity exported to these markets.", the entrepreneur tells us.
However, in order to export honey to the European Union, it is not enough to unite with other beekeepers, collect the cultivated honey and deliver it abroad. The honey must meet the quality standards required by the EU, to be homogenized and processed.

The first export - to Romania

In order to succeed, substantial investments were required and these investments entirely undertaken by the company “Regina Naturii”. "In 2016 we set up a honey processing hall, together with other beekeepers, we collected enough honey to fill a 20-tonne transportation item and we made our first delivery in Romania," the beekeeper reports.

At the beginning, when dealing only with apiculture, the beekeeper benefited from PARE 1 + 1 program, funded from the state budget and from EU funds. Subsequently, investments in the apiary were subsidized by 30% by the State through the Agency for Interventions and Payments in Agriculture. Currently, the situation for Moldovan beekeepers is even better. If the apiary is registered as a business, they can benefit from up to 50% of the investment made in it.

They diversified both the collection area and the sales markets.

As the first exports were successful, the entrepreneurs decided to extend their honey collection area throughout the country.
They did not stop here and continued to look for new sales markets, especially as there are projects that make it easier for them to find these markets. Already in 2017, as part of a World Bank-funded project, "Regina Naturii" asked for a consultation from the consulting firm „Gateway & Partners”, which found a new destination for honey exported by the company from Costeşti and last year the honey reached also Poland.

„Gateway & Partners” is a well-known company established in Latvia and its Moldovan branch succeeded in its first year of activity in 2017 to facilitate the set-up of several partnerships between Moldovan exporting companies and importers from different countries, and especially from the European Union.
According to Cornel Coşer, one of the partners of the Moldovan branch of „Gateway & Partners”, about 80% of partnerships that the company facilitates represent the start of long-lasting collaborations.

The small size of apiaries reduce the competitiveness of Moldovan honey

Contrary to appearances, exporting honey is not so easy to realize. And this is due, primarily because of the too small size of Moldovan apiaries. There are not so many beekeepers that would collect enough honey from their own apiary in order to export it by themselves. Moldovan honey exports are made up from the production of several beekeepers and here lies the main difficulty, as not all Moldovan beekeepers provide quality honey that meets the European requirements.

The biggest issue is related to antibiotic residues in honey, strictly forbidden by European health rules. These residues, according to Nicanor Negru, are usually caused by the treatment of bees with old products, which do not comply with European requirements, although there are enough EU-approved and harmless products to consumers. Therefore, companies that collect honey must also work on explaining this issue among beekeepers. However, during the two years of its activity, the company has established a network of beekeepers from which it collects honey, that corresponds to European standards.

The preparation for export requires a lot of money, effort and time.

The procedure is not at all easy, or each batch of purchased honey, besides the fact that it must be accompanied by documents of origin from beekeepers, must be checked in laboratory conditions and undergo several analyzes. And all these analyzes require time, effort and money. Subsequently, all these batches, if they pass the analyzes, are homogenized in a single batch, which is usually tested by the importing company. Finally, to formalize the export, the honey is to be tested at the laboratory of the Republican Center for Veterinary Diagnosis. Unfortunately, this lab is not well-equipped in order that its analyzes could meet the requirements of European importers, and therefore, the importers prefer to make their own analyses.
All these procedures, but also the fact that the honey is collected from several small beekeepers, leads to considerable increase in the cost of exported honey.
Hard to compete with Ukrainian honey

This issues affect the competitiveness of Moldovan honey on European market. This reality was acutely felt starting with 2016, when, following the conclusion of the Free Trade Agreement between the EU and Ukraine, the Ukrainian honey, much cheaper than the Moldovan one, entered the European market during the same year. If in 2017, the honey harvest of the Republic of Moldova was of 4500 tons, with about 3500 tons exported, Ukraine exported almost 70 thousand tons.

The cooperation between beekeepers, processors and authorities is necessary

However, this barrier does not discourage Nicanor Negru, who understands that for Moldovan honey a better market than the European one does not exist. But for this, the young entrepreneur believes that there must be a strengthening of efforts between beekeepers and processors, which should be supported by the state, eventually through a program.
The problem is that beekeepers and processors or exporters don’t succeed to find the optimal price. The beekeepers consider that the purchase prices offered by exporters are too low, while the latter are of opinion that if the prices increase, the honey will not be demanded on European markets. People still do not understand, how, to a large extent, the market laws work. And, in addition, these quality issues persist.

According to the entrepreneur, in order to obtain a higher added value of exported honey, the honey has to be processed and packed in the Republic of Moldova to reach the shelves of the European shops under the brand "Made in Moldova". Subsequently, the Moldovan honey shall not be exported only as raw material and the trading price would provide more generous profits both to processors and beekeepers. According to the General Director of „Regina Naturii”, till such a goal is achieved, first of all, they should learn to associate and work together.

Ion Chișlea