From: "Mike Rossander" .......some very strong things are being said about
the "ethics" and "purity" of honey which seem a bit over the top."

With all respect to Mike, this seems always the first defence when an
existing practice is questioned. 'Over the top ...If some sugar honey gets
into honey on the shelf, it really doesn't matter'.   Well, everyone has
their own opinion.  In my world, consumers know less and less about how any
food is produced, or any manufactured product.  Milk comes from plastic
bottles, honey from jars, cars from showrooms. At the same time, consumers
are becoming more cautious and expect everything they buy to be of a
guaranteed standard.  They want full disclosure of what it contains and are
suspicious of any ingredients that may be a potential health hazard. (In UK,
there is wholesale rejection of GM as yet another industralized practice
that is not needed under UK conditions but which could well introduce as yet
unknown risks).  Hence the traditional appeal of honey, as picked up by the
survey I quoted,    that honey is a pure 'natural' product.

Once u breach consumer confidence on that - and substitute 'honey is a
product made by bees  from sugars originating from plants, some of which may
have been factory processed before being artificially fed to the bees' - you
will , IMHO, cross a serious boundary.  Apart from anything else, honey in
UK sells for 3.00GBP and Golden Syrup (a viscous golden-coloured  syrup
containing acid-inverted sugar)  for 0.35GBP.  So consumers are paying
3.00-0.65= 2.35GBP for the difference. Put another way, honey is say 20%
water, 78% sugars, and around 2% traces of other components that come with
plant nectar.  The sugar is worth 78% x 0.25GBP = 0.20GBP , so consumers are
paying 3.00-0.20=2.80GBP for the 2%, so at the rate of 2.80/2%= 114 GBP per
lb,  almost 500 times the price of sugar.   If u start to tell them that up
to 25% of the source sugar was factory refined and was simply 100% sucrose,
will they still want to pay such an on-cost for the components that provide
flavour and arguably healthy additions?

Why should beekeepers mind what others may be doing if they do not do it
themselves?  Well, the problem is that 'honey' is product name used
universally around the world.  The consumer tends not to differentiate as
much as they should - though they are learning.  Many people in UK would
never touch beef they know comes from USA, as US producers are believed to
use growth hormones. Similarly, some people will not touch US soya as it is
GM - with the unforetunate consequence that forest is now being cleared in
South America for growing GM-free soya.  US beef may in fact have been
cleared of hormones a long time ago, but a whole generation of beef eaters
will have to die out before the prejudice disappears.  That could happen to
honey if beekeepers world-wide do not keep it clear of
aulteration/contamination/call it what u will.



Mile went on: " 1. Last I heard, sugar was still derived from plants.  (Yes,
I acknowledge that it's factory-processed.)  Even given the legal
definitions that have been cited, you have not yet convinced me that
sugar-based honey is definably different from other-based honey."

Well, the definations of honey used in regulations around the world appear
to manage the differentiation.  I am not a scientist - here are just a few
comments from a 'concerned beekeeper'.
I have already quoted from Eva Crane, a world authority, Honey- a
comprehensive survey, 1975.  It contains a wealth of information about what
is in honey - but as sugar-honey cannot legally be sold as honey, not
surprisingly, there does not seem to be much information on the differences.
The list of sugars and of trace elements that can be in floral honey is very
long - depending on the plant source.  The sugars appear (if I get it right)
to be manfactured by the bees from nectar that is predominently sucrose - so
sugar honey is a similar mix of sugars and enzymes added by bees, but lacks
traces of minerals, vitamins present in nectar.
I do not myself know of serious studies into the properties of sugar-honey ,
hopefully others will point these out. In previous theads we have discussed
the healing properties of at least some floral honeys (Manuka in particular)
and the work by Dr Rose Cooper and others on the differences in
anti-bacterial action between floral and sugar honey.
The point is that floral and sugar honey are made thru different processes -
field collection of nectar expressly produced by the nectaries of plants for
collection by bees and hive-feeding of a refined chemical made by chemical
processing of plant juice obtained by harvesting and smashing the complete
plant.  The first process is 'natural' and subject to all sorts of
difficulties so is expensive but valued by consumers.  The second is simple
but counts as a part of industrialised food production.

Mike again: 2.  "Sugar is not dangerous to eat (excluding obesity risk which
is not the point of the discussion).  Throwing around the word
"contamination" in the context of sugar in my honey strikes me as
irresponsible.  "Contamination" is an emotionally laden word with very
strong connotations of toxicity and danger.  Please find a different word."

Again, this is potentially dangerously misleading.  Sugar IS dangerous to
eat, in quantity, because the human body is not adapted to its conversion,
and diabetes can and is resulting.  Honey does not cause diabetes (so I
believe), as the % sucrose is tiny.  Now, sugar-honey does not contain
sucrose, so is also safe (so I believe).  But what matters is not  my belief
but consumers' perceptions.  While regulations world-wide state that selling
sugar-honey as honey is illegal, someone clearly thinks there IS a
difference.
>
Mike continues:  "3.  Feeding sugar with the INTENT to dilute or replace
nectar-based honey certainly falls over the line of consumer deception, but
... 4.  Trace or insignificant amounts of sugar-based honey does not
automatically spoil the whole batch."

Once again, Mike (a producer) is challenging what is or is not acceptable,
in denial of world-wide regulations laid down for consumer protection by
food standards organisations.  "Trace or insignificant amounts" - how much
is that?  Rothamstaed found that up to 25% addition of sugar honey was not
perceptible by taste.  So, those who believe honey is no more than
nicely-flavoured sugar may say 25% is insignificant.  Does the consumer?

Mike pleads:  "Pure" anything is a myth.  We can strive for purity.  We can
achieve 99.99...% of purity.  But we can never achieve a guarantee of
"purity".  You may not feed sugar, but do you really want to set a level of
consumer expectation that will put you at risk if your bees rob a little
from the hive of a neighbor who does? "

Oh dear, this one again.  'We cannot acheive 100% (as we all now live in a
polluted environment) so there is no difference between 99% and 75%'.
Well...... A recent UK survey of 155 people found levels of toxins in their
bodies up to 100 times the 'safe' level.  So lets all just be complacent and
keep producing / eating whatever is just most conveneient.  Well
............

Mike ends:  " Can we move past the emotional rhetoric of absolutism and
purity to a more nuanced discussion of intent and maybe thresholds?"
That's a discussion u should have with the food standards organisations.
Your argument that it's easier and more profitable for beekeeper to use
sugar feeding to the extent that,  perhaps an (unknown) bit is likely to end
up in the crop, may go down well ....or not.

But let's end on a positive note. There is absolutely nothing wrong (so far
as I know) with sugar-honey as a food.   It just has to be sold as such -
and priced honestly and fairly.  It is easy and reliable to produce.  It
could be a mainstay for beekeepers in areas with irregular forage.  An
enormous market could exist in say sports drinks - althletes recover faster
with drinks made from honey than sucrose. Althletes panting by the roadside
are not interested in the fine flavour of a speciality honey - nor
particularly are children tired after school.
A whole host of vitaminised or medicinal sugar-honeys are possible.  Naum
Iolrish, Bees and People, Mir Publishers Moscow, 1974 listed Russian
experiments with: egg/milk/rosehip syrup (milk honey has a whitish yellow
colour and tastes of fruit drops - when I tried it, I got a horrid mess in
the combs),  calcium cloride for calcium honey, foxglove for medicinal
digitalis honey.  Carrot juice honey was No. 59, to give an idea of the
list. Does anyone know if the Russians contnue to produce a range of
sugar-honies?

Eva Crane's reference to sugar-honey being legal for sale in France suggests
an industry.  Unforetunately I can find nothing in just the three French
manuals I have. Can anyone illuminate the situation in France?  How is
sugar-honey priced alongside floral honey?

Robin dartington

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