Leskovac Gets Biggest Factory of Supplements for Bees in Serbia – Api Trade Increasing Capacities by 100% and Preparing for Export (PHOTO)

The company Api Trade from Leskovac has been producing liquid and solid food and protective products for bees, as well as honeycomb bases, for 20 years now, and now it is expanding its production capacities by launching a facility in Leskovac on around 700 m2, which will be the biggest factory in Serbia for the production of supplements for beekeeping.

As Zvonimir Vasic, the owner of founder of this company with around 15 employees, says for eKapija, beekeeping has been flourishing in Serbia and the demand for their products is increasing.

– Serbia currently has the biggest exporting price of honey in Serbia, EUR 7. We have a very high-quality honey, which is in demand everywhere, and with the increase of the number of hives, our business grows as well. That is why we bought the halls of the former Proleter factory in Leskovac and we are now finalizing the organization of a new production of supplements and vitamins for bees – Vasic says.

Until now, he says, they produced supplements at the Nevena factory, but they didn’t have the conditions required for export there.

– Now, however, the market is increasingly demanding and we will increase those capacities for the production of supplements for the feeding and strengthening of bees, vitamin products and probiotics at the new factory – our interviewee says.

At the moment, he says, Api Trade has veterinary numbers for the export of food for bees and wax to the region and the EU.

– We export those products to Croatia, North Macedonia, Kosovo and Metohija, Albania and Romania. Everything that is produced in that field needs to meet certain requirements when it comes to production premises, based on which the Veterinary Department and international commissions give the veterinary number, and the premises at which we produced supplements did not meet the conditions for export, which will now change – Vasic explains.

Regarding the competition, Vasic explains that bee supplements are produced in another two locations in Serbia, but in smaller quantities.

– The problem, however, is non-certified production and illegal sale. Ads are full of such products which are concocted in basements – Vasic complains, but also adds that they can’t produce what Api Trade offers either.

That, he says, is the only locally made product for the protection from varroa, a honey bee mite, and it is based on hop beta acids.

– We have also made a good thymol-based gel for the feeding of bees in cooperation with the Faculty of Chemistry, and we are also representatives of the famous Japanese-German factory Emro and here we distribute their probiotic for bees – says the owner of the company, which, in addition to that, also has its own bees, which gather pollen and honey on the slopes of the Kukavica Mountain.

B. P.

API TRADE VASIĆ

Api trade Leskovac

Emro

Zvonimir Vasić

beekeeping

supplements for bees

vitamins

probiotics

protection of bees

factory

production

export

feeding

food for bees

bee wax

honeycomb bases

Proleter Leskovac

thymol based gel

varroa