This latest fiasco started last week when a number of Canadian beekeepers got together and launched a petition demanding that the owner of Canada’s biggest honey brands stop using imported honey in their products, reported CTV News Canada.
A petition on Change.org with over 71,000 signatures, is calling on Billy Bee and its parent company, McCormick Canada to “buy Canadian honey first and help ensure that the Canadian bee industry can remain a healthy one.”
The petition, written by Allan Campbell, who runs Dunston Honey Farms in Dauphin, Manitoba, claims that cheaper Imported honey from China and Argentina is being mixed with higher quality Canadian honey.
Campbell claims honey companies have been mixing cheaper imported honey in their products for years. He says the companies say it is because there isn’t enough of a supply of Canadian honey. “That’s far from true,” Campbell told CTVNews.ca by phone.
The incident that brought everything to a head occurred when Billy Bee told Campbell they wouldn’t be buying his product this year. Huffington Post quoted Campbell: “I have sold two or three loads of honey to Billy Bee for years and years,” he said. “But this year, we’re being told flat-out, ‘No, we’re not interested, we have everything we need.’ That’s all the explanation that a producer gets.”
Andrew Foust, a spokesman for McCormick Canada confirmed Campbell’s claim saying that Billy Bee makes its honey by using a “small portion of Argentinian honey,” while its Natural Honey Farms brand uses Chinese honey. He also added that 85 percent of the honey used by McCormick comes from Canadian beekeepers.
Canadian consumers need to be careful when buying honey says Kevin Nixon of the Canadian Honey Council. He explained that the jars will have all kinds of labels such as “Canada No. 1 White,” but he says this is just a grading system and does not mean it is pure Canadian honey.
Shoppers need to read the back label to see where the honey comes from. “I find that misleading,” Nixon said. He also points out that there are a lot of products on store shelves that are 100 percent Canadian, and they are priced competitively with Billy Bee. “The savings that some of these companies are seeing by buying cheap foreign honey isn’t being passed on to the consumer in most cases.”
There are 7,000 beekeepers in Canada, tending over 600,000 hives. The hives produce about 75 million pounds of honey every year. The bee farms are spread out through Manitoba, Saskatchewan, and Alberta, which produce 2/3 of Canadian honey. The other 1/3 of the total pounds of honey comes from other areas of Canada.
