Digitizing the value chain of organic beekeeping products

The EU numbers approximately 600 000 beekeepers, with total production of 200 000 tons of honey. This can’t satisfy the EU market and the shortfall is made up by imports with questionable product qualities and traceability. Threats to bee health and market competition make the economic viability of apiculture a critical matter. The project aims to take action to overcome current problems in the development of native beekeeping by developing and testing an innovative intelligent system for monitoring the process of raising bee families, as a tool aimed at risk management and early warning on farms a system for tracking the entire production and marketing process of honey and bee products from the hive to the consumer table. The proposed system intends to increase the sustainability and transparency in the honey supply chain, by introducing IoT technologies in the production and processing stages, thus to improve the competitiveness of the apiculture sector. The main means of achieving this goals are: - Using specialized drones and real time image recognition programs for precise observation and analysis of apiary regions; - IoT based real-time monitoring of apiary and beehive environment, as well as beehive interior and bee behavior in terms of the presence of different polluting factors; - Cloud based storing and analyzing of all collected data with the aim of early warning to beekeepers and the prevention of possible negative effects on bees and their production; - Reliable and unique marking of the products, produced by apiary, in order to adequately track them throughout the manufacturer's chain of business through the market to the final consumer and to ensure quality that meets the relevant food safety standards.

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