Slovenia takes initiative in efforts to protect bees and other pollinators
Ljubljana, 17 December - Slovenia successfully spearheaded an initiative to declare 20 May, the date of birth of Slovenian beekeeper Anton Janša, World Bee Day, a United Nations endorsement that was seen as a major achievement for Slovenia's foreign policy and a strong symbolic step for the protection of pollinators.
Ljubljana
The Carniolan honey bee native to Slovenia.
Photo: STA
As a follow-up, Slovenia hosted in May an international beekeeping conference, featuring agriculture officials from 22 countries. The event was part of the three-day celebration of the first World Bee Day.
Slovenia also launched this May an initiative for an EU protection of bees to provide beekeeping the same support, political and financial, as agriculture in general enjoys. Meanwhile, it continues to promote honeybees in tourism, where apitourism is evolving into a new tourism branch and is becoming an increasingly popular niche travel trend.
In June, the Slovenian Beekeepers' Association received one of this year's European Citizen's Prizes in recognition of its efforts to declare 20 May World Bee Day.