Honey Laundering: A sticky trail of intrigue and crime:
".........He was suspected of trafficking in counterfeit merchandise -- a honey smuggler.
A far cry from the innocent image of Winnie the Pooh with a paw stuck in the honey pot, the international honey trade has become increasingly rife with crime and intrigue.
In the U.S., where bee colonies are dying off and demand for imported honey is soaring, traders of the thick amber liquid are resorting to elaborate schemes to dodge tariffs and health safeguards in order to dump cheap honey on the market, a five-month Seattle P-I investigation has found.
The business is plagued by foreign hucksters and shady importers who rip off conscientious U.S. packers with honey diluted with sugar water or corn syrup -- or worse, tainted with pesticides or antibiotics.........."
Wow! I never thought of that! I had no idea that there was a shortage of honey due to the hive collapse. Read the whole thing.
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I've turned into quite the honey-monster over the past few months (thought I didn't like it since childhood, then actually tasted it!) and may be partly responsible for the shortage I suppose.
This food adulteration seems to be horribly common these days. Over here in Scotland there were stories about how cheap wine (basically anything £5 or under per bottle) was more than likely shot full of sugar, water and flavourings. Now if you're buying a sub-£5 bottle you're obviously no connoisseur but these guys aren't even obliged to list the additional contents on the packaging. It's not smuggled or anything, just annoys the hell out of me...
This hasn't just started happening. It's notorious in the homey industry as a whole, and I stopped buying honey about ten years ago because of it.
That's why I only buy honey from MSU's Department of Entomology, where I actually know the people working with the bees.