Perhaps it is a fact of getting older or just something to do with relativity, but this year seems to have gone faster than any of the previous ones! It has been a sad and troubled year for many people and countries around the world. These troubles have their economic repercussions which then have a knock-on effect on the work of the Trust and also on the availability of research grants from other sources including governments.
As stewards of Eva Crane’s legacy, we want to ensure that we have the funds to help others carry on her work and fulfil her wishes long into the future. Therefore, it was a hard decision to call a 12-month moratorium on our grant giving activities just when those grants were most needed. However, we needed to apply some of our resources to up-dating and expanding our website as well as trying to make it more efficient and user friendly. The website is vital to our work. Our Founder’s greatest talent was probably in the collation and dissemination of the results of research and discoveries in all aspects of bee science and beekeeping. We hope our new website makes a major contribution in that field. We want it to be a point of contact for those who are doing bee research, those who are interested in the history of beekeeping, indeed to everyone who has a love of bees and the environment.
We have now eased the brakes on our grant giving but will continue to carefully scrutinise all applications and be rigorous in enforcing the criteria we have laid out relating to those applications. We hope, that by building on the past and encouraging the work going on at present, we can, in some small way, help develop a better beekeeping future worldwide.
At the end of the year one of our Board Members, Clementine Smith, decided to take retirement after giving nine years of committed service to the Trust.
Clementine was the wife of Judge David Smith who was the honorary secretary of IBRA for over 50 years and a founder member of this Trust. David died in March 2015 and it seemed logical that Clementine should take his place on the Board. From his schooldays David was a beekeeper and so when she married him Clementine knew that the bees came too! She helped him with his small apiary and was always involved in the conferences and meetings organized by IBRA. In this millennium she was a stalwart helper on the IBRA book stand at conferences and shows at home and abroad. Most important of all over the years she got to know Eva Crane well. That interest coupled with her many years as a Justice of the Peace, with the analysis and assessment that demanded, all served her well as we established the Trust’s modus vivendi over the years. We are grateful for her, always well considered, input and know that she will continue to take an interest in our work as an honorary, non-voting, member of the board.
I hope you find our website of interest and will continue to follow our efforts in the coming year. A year which we can but hope will be more peaceful for all.
Holiday greetings to you all and a Happy New Year to bees everywhere.
Richard Jones.
December 2024.