Pests Gone, Coffee-Flavored Honey Flourishes

Since October 2017, Nagori Sait Buttu Saribu has been combining coffee cultivation and bee farming in Simalungun, North Sumatra. The pests have gone and local farmers are enjoying the bonus of coffee-flavored honey.

KOMPAS/PRIYOMBODO

A close-up of a bee cage shows honeycombs within. The cage was placed on Thursday (14/12/2017) within a coffee farm in Berastagi, North Sumatra, as a pilot for an integrated beekeeping and coffee cultivation method.

Since October 2017, Nagori Sait Buttu Saribu has been combining coffee cultivation and bee farming in Simalungun, North Sumatra. The results have been stunning. The pests have gone and local farmers are enjoying the bonus of coffee-flavored honey.

Colonies of farmed bees are abuzz in the coffee plantations of Nagori Sait Buttu Saribu in Pamatang Sidamanik district, Simalungun regency, North Sumatra. A decade after wild bees were driven away by chemical pesticides, the coffee plantations are flourishing once again. Today, the bees protect the coffee plants from pest infestation.