At Honeybee Heroes, we’re delighted to see that tourists around the world are being more mindful in their travels and making conscious efforts to give back to the places they visit—both to the people, and the environment. That’s why we’re so excited to announce a new initiative in partnership with Mantis Collection and Community Conservation Fund Africa (CCFA), giving all Mantis Collection hotel guests worldwide the opportunity to sponsor a Honeybee Heroes hive!
Mantis—which stands for “Man And Nature Together Is Sustainable”—has a broad network of boutique hotels, eco-lodges and waterways around the world. Since 2018, CCFA, the nonprofit arm of the Mantis Collection, has collaborated with conservation groups across Africa to protect vulnerable animal populations while uplifting local communities. From planting indigenous trees in township schools in the Eastern Cape and gorilla conservancy in Uganda to ending period poverty in Namibia and more, the CCFA has initiated a number of sustainability projects in communities nearby to Mantis hotels across the continent.
Our friends over at CCFA are already involved in local bee conservation: they house hives on all Mantis lodges in the Eastern Cape, having re-homed almost 1.5 million bees and created three permanent jobs for local community members. That’s an incredible start, and we’re excited to help them expand on that work through this new collaboration.
We’ve begun installation of three permanent apiaries to house the Mantis Collection hives: on our farm at Willowdale, another farm down the road, and at Hazendal, a Mantis property in Stellenbosch. We’re also hoping to set up one permanent apiary at a Mantis lodge where guests can participate in live beekeeping experiences with a trained community beekeeper on site. The more hives that Mantis hotel guests adopt, the quicker we can make that dream a reality!
To get guests excited about adopting hives, we’ve placed miniature beehives at Mantis check-in desks and in guest rooms at Mantis lodges around the world, with QR codes for guests to scan and get more information on Capensis bees and what it means to adopt a hive. We’re also going to place large-scale art installations of mannequin beekeepers and beehives in several hotel communal spaces, and some Mantis hotel restaurants will even be featuring Honeybee Heroes honey as part of their menu.
We just kicked off the partnership last month, and CCFA has already facilitated 15 hive adoptions, rapidly moving us closer to our goal of 100 hives adopted by the end of July. As a thanks for sponsoring a hive, Mantis guests have the option to stop by our farm for a free beekeeping experience and honey tasting.
Working with the CCFA is a big step for our small team, giving us the opportunity to grow our sanctuary and share the news about our work with thousands of sustainability-minded tourists worldwide. And for Mantis hotel guests, it’s a unique, experiential conservation project that guests can visit, participate in, and learn from while directly impacting the local environment. We call that a win-win!
To our partners at CCFA and Mantis Collection, thanks so much for supporting our work and for continuing to demonstrate your commitment to our beautiful continent!
Visit www.ccfa.africa to learn more.
Comments