Abstract

Ethiopia is one of the few countries in the world with a long tradition of beekeeping. Honey is the most important primary product of beekeeping both from a quantitative and an economic point of view. Apiculture in eastern Ethiopia allows impoverished or low-income people to supplement their earnings by selling harvested bee products such as honey and beeswax at a suitable market. Due to the lack of technology, knowledge, and skill in honey production, honey and beeswax extraction is still very traditional in Ethiopia. This study aimed to adapt, manufacture, and evaluate the performance of the small-scale solar beeswax extractor. Temperature and Extracted beeswax weight recording were undertaken for extractor efficiency during the evaluation of loading different kg of honeycomb. The result shows the amount of beeswax extracted was increased with the honeycomb placed on the extractor. From 2kg and 6kg of honeycombs, 270g and 970g of beeswax were respectively extracted. However, the maximum efficiency of 20.05 % was obtained when the extractor was loaded with 4kg of honeycomb and placed under the sun for five hours. The color of the extracted beeswax also varies with the amount of honeycomb loaded; the best quality of the beeswax was obtained a light-yellow color at a temperature of 61.2ºC – 64.3ºC.

Keywords: Beeswax, Extractor, Honeycombs, Solar