The Story Behind Kwekwivala
In 2016 I met a farmer who introduced me to beekeeping and taught me about the importance of bees. This inspired me to learn more about beekeeping and how to get involved with it myself. After some research, my new-found interest sprouted into a tangible project, and in 2018 I started to make beehives. By 2019 I had made 102 bee hives, but was still entirely self-taught at this point, so I decided to seek expert advice on how to proceed with this project.
After a short time, I found the Ifulong Cultural Tourism organization, which does beekeeping as one of their environmental conservation projects. I learned that they also provide training on beekeeping, so I decided to travel up to Arusha and participate in this. Madam Esther Semchimba was one of the beekeeping experts that I learned from. She not only taught me the ABCs of beekeeping, but also taught me about the different products that I could make with beeswax, such as petroleum jelly. I took this new knowledge home with me and applied it to my own beekeeping practice. Eventually I was able to make beeswax of my own, and used it to create a purified and natural version of petroleum jelly, which I call Kwekwivala.