IN keeping with its continued commitment to youth and community development, United Way recently provided funding of $1.3 million to the Spring Village Development Foundation’s Bee Keeping Project.

The project has proven to be very successful in that it engaged some 30 at risk persons in apicultural best practices.

In all 23 persons were fully trained; a training/production apiary with approximately 50 colonies was established; a commercial sized honey extractor and other equipment were procured; 70 gallons of honey and a large quantity of bees wax were produced and the Spring Village Bee Farmers’ Benevolent Society was established.

In addition, the project assisted with securing packaging including bar codes for the marketing of honey products and assisted in establishing five apiaries for members.

“The investment was well made as 23 young entrepreneurs from the community have been given the opportunity to better their lives through the bee keeping project,” said United Way Chairman, Noel daCosta.

“United Way is pleased to have provided them with the funding to expand their productive capacity and to positively impact their community”.

Randy Finnikin, executive director of the Spring Village Foundation, thanked United Way for their sensitivity to the needs of grass roots organizations and their willingness to support ventures of this nature.

He said the foundation was established with the mandate to empower the residents of Spring Village to achieve self-reliance in order to improve their educational, spiritual, social, economic and environmental wellbeing. This came against the background of a high rate of unemployment, high dropout rate from school, the worrying number of unplanned pregnancies, drug abuse, and child neglect among other socio economic conditions.