The Single Story Trust

Western Australia has the healthiest bees in the world, and we want to do everything we can do to maintain this privilege.

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Western Australia’s native forests in the south-west of the state are an important and valuable asset to the Western Australian community. These forests provide Western Australians with diverse opportunities and values including recreation, conservation, and economic. Our purpose is to foster, promote and enhance a sustainable natural forest in Western Australia by protecting the unique WA forests and our bees; and by communicating the unique features of WA forests, WA bees and WA’s unique flora honey.

Our Programs serve our purpose

Preservation and sustainable development of WA native forests with a focus on improving honey production.

Honeybees thrive where they are safe and in return produce healthy honey. The management, preservation and restocking of existing forests as an ecosystem and natural habitat where honeybees co-exists with other native species is important. Our focus is preserving, managing and restocking the forest to provide a safe environment for honeybees. This program also improves the quality of human life by soaking up pollution and dust from the air, rebuild natural habitats and ecosystems, and mitigate climate change by capturing atmospheric carbon dioxide.

Protecting the pollinators – Biosecurity efforts towards protecting WA bees

Honeybees thrive where they are safe and in return pollinate the plants that provide food security. Our biosecurity efforts are towards ensuring WA maintains its high biosecurity standards in keeping WA free from new biosecurity threats that affect honeybees and the native forests. WA is currently the only state in Australia free fromVarroa mite which is known to kill both honeybees and native bees.

Research towards WA native trees in relation to honey, nectar and pollen

The endemic forests of WA provide a diverse range of opportunities for in relation to honey, nectar and pollen. It is this valuable asset that this program aims to capture. It includes research towards detecting the provenance of honey, nectar and pollen and research towards the health benefits of the products produced from these endemic forests.

Economic development for WA honey and WA bees

WA bees are one of the healthiest bees in the world due to the high biosecurity laws in WA and the natural environment provided by the old-growth native forests. This protected environment enables WA to successfully breed bee colonies for export markets as well as providing healthy bee colonies to other Australian states.

WA endemic forest also provides a rare opportunity for Geographical indications that would position Western Australian Honey as a unique, high-quality product on the global stage, thereby enhancing its economic, environmental, and cultural value.

This program involves establishing a Geographical Indication (GI) reputation which includes formulising the certification of honey, establishing quality and labelling standards, promoting the provenance of the honey, protecting the natural forests, protecting WA honeybees from biosecurity threats, improving apiary training, adding a layer of authenticity for consumers, encouraging research towards these endemic forests, registering intellectual property rights to protect the GIs, and achieving international trade recognition by including WA honey as a GI in world trade agreements. The current scope of the project is for JARRAH honey to become an Australian GI.