author(s)
Rakesh Das, N Snehalata, Gautam Kunal and Shantanu Jha

abstract
Stingless bee is the smallest honey producing bee which is not commonly used commercially and its cultivation and maintenance is called “meliponiculture”. The honey produced by stingless bee has high medicinal value. The Naga tribes use to keep this bee in their houses as a habit. Both terrestrial (Tetragonula irridipenis) and underground (Lophotrigona canifrons) bees are found to keep in their houses. But due to lack of knowledge, meliponiculture has not been picked up by villagers of Nagaland as a component of rural livelihood. They use traditional methods for maintaining of these bees. Hence awareness activity and training programme to the farmers to adopt scientific method is urgently required for upliftment of this as a part of rural livelihood.