The European Commission has investigated imports of honey into the European Union, and found that nearly half of the imports are fraudulent because the honey is adulterated with syrup.
In a report called Food Fraud: How Genuine is Your Honey?, the commission said fake honey is a tempting market because of the price gap between sugar syrup and authentic honey.
It found that 46% of the honey imported into the EU was adulterated, with high percentages from a number of countries.
“Of the honey imports into Europe from China, nearly 75% was fraudulent, based on testing of random samples of honey shipments from more than 20 countries. The percentage of fake honey from Turkey was even higher, at 93%,” reported producer.com.
In 2021, using EU data, Chinese exports to Europe were 48,000 tonnes, 28% of all imported honey in the EU.
