Honey fraud in the UK

[mbc]

Do you think that all honey testing is pointless? Should we just accept that Chinese honey is authentic but super-cheap despite all of the reports to the contrary, statistics on Chinese hive numbers vs exports over recent decades and blatant advertising on Alibaba for 'honey syrup' that passes the fraud tests?

Absolutely not, the supermarkets and food processors have to take responsibility.
It is a fact that the NMR tests, which give a molecular profile of the substance being tested, are only as good as the reference library of profiles they have to compare against.
The EU with it's high standards and all its might as a trading block has the best chance of revealing the fraudsters and staying ahead of them, but there needs to be political will to achieve this, and then of course the UK would only be a smeared shadow of what the EU achieve hanging on their coat tails.
I think the reason most fake honey gets under the radar is because it's not in most people's interest to reveal it, it's hidden as a constituent of something else, chilli sauce or honey nut cornflakes, honey in a jar is much easier to judge by anyone with a reasonable pallet.

 

[bobba]

I think calling if "Fake" honey is very misleading. I suspect all those jars contain some % of real honey.

I think they need to be more specific and explain that they blieve their samples contain bulking agents and are not 100% pure honey.

If they truly are 0% real honey than I am shocked.

I would not be surprised if some of the big honey packers have been fooled by some of the bulking agents and have probably passed them on unknowingly. Its an arms race to keep up with the fakers.

I have always thought that all the dodgy honey producers would need to do is feed their bees all year long, then produce tons of c$%p honey. I suspect this already happens, and with so much filtered honey on the market, I don't see how this could be detected. (the filter remove pollen, so it cannot be distinguished from flower honey). Is this kind of honey technically fake? You would not say an egg was fake if a chicken was fed an artificial diet. So I think it all gets very grey.

So I think a distinction is needed between the following:
Naturally foraged honey
Honey produced with an artificial diet
Honey cut with bulking agents.

Unfortunately we don't have easily available tech to distinguish them in a lab.

 

[Erichalfbee]

So I think a distinction is needed between the following:
Naturally foraged honey
Honey produced with an artificial diet
Honey cut with bulking agents.

I should put Raw Honey, Naturally foraged in the Hedgerows of Rural Wales on my label.... That should do it

 

[gmonag]

So I think a distinction is needed between the following:
Naturally foraged honey
Honey produced with an artificial diet
Honey cut with bulking agents.

Honey has a well defined meaning in EU (and now UK) law.
The EU defines honey as “the natural sweet substance produced by Apis mellifera bees from the nectar of plants […], which the bees collect, transform by combining with specific substances of their own, deposit, dehydrate, store and leave in honeycombs to ripen and mature”.

No need for further distinctions.

 

[bobba]

I should put Raw Honey, Naturally foraged in the Hedgerows of Rural Wales on my label.... That should do it

100% Raw Honey, Naturally foraged in the Hedgerows of Rural Wales

 

[bobba]

Honey has a well defined meaning in EU (and now UK) law.
The EU defines honey as “the natural sweet substance produced by Apis mellifera bees from the nectar of plants […], which the bees collect, transform by combining with specific substances of their own, deposit, dehydrate, store and leave in honeycombs to ripen and mature”.

No need for further distinctions.

An interesting definition.

So if bees collect Honeydew, then its technically not honey?

 

[Ian123]

An interesting definition.

So if bees collect Honeydew, then its technically not honey?

Yes honeydew is honey and falls into legal definition. Definition above is not complete.

 

[gmonag]

https://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2015/1348/made
For completeness:
Definition of “honey” and different types of honey
2.—(1) In these Regulations “honey” means the natural sweet substance produced by Apis mellifera bees from the nectar of plants or from secretions of living parts of plants or excretions of plant-sucking insects on the living parts of plants which the bees collect, transform by combining with specific substances of their own, deposit, dehydrate, store and leave in honeycombs to ripen and mature.

(2) In these Regulations—

“baker’s honey” means honey that is suitable for industrial use or as an ingredient in another foodstuff which is then processed;

“blossom honey” and “nectar honey” mean honeys obtained from the nectar of plants;

“chunk honey” and “cut comb in honey” mean honeys which contain one or more pieces of comb honey;

“comb honey” means honey stored by bees in the cells of freshly built broodless combs or thin comb foundation sheets made solely of beeswax and sold in sealed whole combs or sections of such combs;

“drained honey” means honey obtained by draining de-capped broodless combs;

“extracted honey” means honey obtained by centrifuging de-capped broodless combs;

“filtered honey” means honey obtained by removing foreign inorganic or organic matters in such a way as to result in the significant removal of pollen;

“honeydew honey” means honey obtained mainly from excretions of plant sucking insects (Hemiptera) on the living part of plants or secretions of living parts of plants;

“pressed honey” means honey obtained by pressing broodless combs with or without the application of moderate heat not exceeding 45° Celsius.