1. One-third of the food we eat depends on Honeybee pollination in particular. Their
population is declining at a scary rate, and native bees can’t support our agricultural
system. They are vital to the concept of sustainability. Buying honey from your local bee
keepers is a good way to support their efforts, and be healthy. Honey is a great
supplement for your body. It is full of vitamins, minerals, antioxidants and living
enzymes which are all very useful to your body. Or does it? According to a study done
by Food Safety News over three quarters of Honey sold in America’s stores and
supermarkets is not honey at all (Huffington Post). So what is it? It’s a watered down
solution of honey with many additives, many of which are not good for you. Plus it
doesn’t contain any pollen, which means according to the FDA that it isn’t honey
whatsoever. Where does it come from? Well that’s the problem; because it is so diluted
and all of the pollen was cooked out it is nearly untraceable. However many are very
positive that honey that doesn’t contain pollen mainly comes from Asia, and really in
most cases China in particular. It’s extremely cheap and because of how cheap it is
many American bee keepers are being forced out of business. Not only that, but
because it comes from China it is unregulated. This means that there are traces of
heavy metal toxins and agro-chemicals fill the “honey” as well as sometimes illegal
animal antibiotics that are fatal to a small portion of the population. To try to prevent the
honey from flooding our markets, strict tariffs have been put into place. Unfortunately
the honey still makes it to America via other means such as transshipping through other
countries and smuggling it in because they made it untraceable. If you want to find safe
delicious honey you should hit up your local farmers market. According to a test done at
Texas A&M, 76% of honey sold at supermarkets is the diluted, pollen free crap (for lack
of a better word). However when testing farmers market and health store honey almost
all of it contained pollen and was the real deal.
References
Cathy Lowden, bee keeper
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/richard-schiffman/most-store-bought-honey-i_b_1118564.html