Best Oromian Honey Types
The district of Bore is located in the Ethiopian Guji highlands, home to the eponymous indigenous community. Apart from honey, which is used as a food, a medicine, and an ingredient used to prepare beverages such as mead (locally known as boka), the indigenous people also farm cattle and grow grains and legumes.
The honey is produced by bees during the rainy season which lasts around 7 months each year, resulting in lots of flowers. The bees make two types of honey in their traditional hives called gagura – white honey and dark, amber-colored honey.
Produced in the area of Wenchi volcano in the Ethiopian Oromia region, this honey is gathered between October and December, at the end of the rainy season. The honey comes from traditional cylindrical hives, made with a combination of bamboo, banana-like leaves, wood, and straw.
The bees in the area are quite aggressive, so the beekeepers collect the honey exclusively at nighttime, using smoke in the process, which somewhat compromises the quality of the product. After the honey has been extracted with a wooden spatula, a knife, and a bowl, it is brought to the village while still in its hive.
Rira honey is produced in Rira village in the Ethiopian region of Oromia by the Arsi-Oromo people. They hang the hives on the highest tree branches of trees such as Cordia africana, Hagenia, and Podocarpus. The hives are traditionally made with a combination of bamboo, vines, and straw.
The bees make this unique honey from the nectar of different plants such as garamba, badesa, gale, and heto. It is this biodiversity that makes Rira honey unique and medicinally valuable. The honey is collected between April and May, at the end of the rainy season, only during the night, because African bees are very aggressive so appropriate clothing and skilled use of smoke are a necessity.
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