Bees for Development Journal 100
PRACTICAL BEEKEEPING Example calculation for Basic Recipe 1 - Olive, Sunflower, Palm and Coconut Oil
oil in a recipe which calls for palm oil, the resulting soap will be softer than anticipated. You may also find that some oil labelled ‘vegetable oil’ will give no further indication of what specific oil the bottle contains. A local person may be able to recognise the oil or you may be able to contact the manufacturer to determine from what plant the oil is derived.
Oil in recipe
Coconut oil
Making changes to the recipe
Palm oil
You may substitute oils in recipes which have the same or very close NaOH factors. The above recipe calls for sunflower oil. The NaOH factor for sunflower oil is 0.136 so appropriate substitutions would be olive oil or soya oil which have the same NaOH factor. Corn, palm kernel and peanut oils, with NaOH factors of 0.137 are close enough that the substitution can be made without doing any calculations. Other substitutions will require a calculation of the amount of NaOH to use.
Olive oil
Sunflower oil
Coconut Corn
Cotton Olive Palm
Palm kernel Peanut Soya
Sunflower
X X X X X X X X X
175 X 150 X 125 X
0.184 =
86g
0.136 =
20g
0.143 = 0.136 = =
For a 10% super-fatted soap: 148 g x 0.9 = 133 g NaOH
25g 17g
148g
To calculate water required: 133 g NaOH ÷ 0.56 = 238 g water
Further reading
ROBB, S. (2009) Dr Sara’s honey potions. Northern Bee Books. Mytholmroyd, UK. Available to buy from the BfD website store: www.beesfordevelopment.org
Table 1: Calculating the maximum amount of NaOH to use in soap recipes Oil (g) X
468 X
NaOH factor = NaOH required (g)
Total NaOH required to convert all oil to soap
When developing products in different regions, modifications to familiar recipes may be necessary to accommodate local ingredients, and the recommendations provided here will provide a starting point. Oil in recipe
Oil (g) X
NaOH factor = NaOH required (g)
A new book Bee Healthy, Bee Beautiful by Sara Robb is soon to be published. Watch for the review in a future edition of BfDJ. “A recipe book focusing on the anti-oxidant properties of bee products and how to incorporate them into your diet and beauty routine”.
0.184 = 0.137 = 0.139 = 0.136 = 0.143 = 0.137 = 0.137 = 0.136 = 0.136 =
Total NaOH required to convert all oil to soap
=
Sara Robb and Jayen Chandarana
Sara Robb has a PhD in neuroscience from Hershey Medical School, Pennsylvania, USA. In 2003 she started her company Bath Potions which specialises in cosmetics containing honey and beeswax. Sara has a continued interest in developing value added products for beekeepers.
Honeycare Tanzania was established in 2004 to trade in honey and provide training, support and equipment to beekeepers. Currently, Honeycare Tanzania has ten collection centres in Tanzania where honey and beeswax are bought from village beekeepers and training is provided. Honeycare Tanzania pays a fair price to the beekeepers for their produce.
Contact Jayen Chandarana, Operations Director, Honeycare Tanzania, PO Box 2635, Dar es Salaam, Tanzania
Crucial value of pollinators
operates a beekeeping programme which receives €32 m (US$46 m) per year. Friedhelm Schmider, Director General of the European Crop Protection Association (ECPA), told the Conference, "Today we have seen broad consensus on issues of timely relevance to European agriculture and the preservation of not only pollinator species, but biodiversity in general. It is reassuring to see that we are all moving in the right direction. Continued research into the drivers of pollinator population change will equip us with the knowledge to ensure sustainable agriculture and a European landscape that is beneficial to biodiversity and maintenance of ecosystem services. Collaboration among all stakeholders is vital for success."
An EU Parliamentary Conference on 28 June was told that more research is required to understand the drivers of pollinator population change. The hearing heard that pollination is crucial for the sexual reproduction of flowering plants, and thus for agriculture. Simon Potts, University of Reading, UK, said: “Nearly 75% of the world's crop species rely to some extent on insect pollination. Pollinators contribute an estimated €153 bn (US$221 bn) to the global economy and account for approximately 9% of agricultural food production". He explained that the honey bee is responsible for one third of insect pollination and that most pollination services are provided by wild bees and other insects.
The Conference saw the official launch of the report Pollinators and Agriculture by the ECPA and the European landowners' organisation, which examines the diversity and functions of insect pollinators. It describes the value of pollination to agriculture, looks at the trends in pollinator population decline and explores options for reversing this trend.
Representatives of NGOs, farmers and land owners, beekeepers, scientists, MEPs and the crop protection industry attended the conference. They discussed the role of pollinators, their importance to agriculture and practical measures for enhancing their populations.
Martin Banks (29 June 2011), www.theparliament.com
Luxembourg EPP member Astrid Lulling pointed out that the EU already
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