A high-tech honey-testing machine unveiled Thursday in Chilliwack could help B.C. beekeepers root out “adulterated” honey imports that threaten to cheapen their product.
Using a nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) machine, Peter Awram’s lab will be able to determine if cheap sweeteners, such as corn syrup or rice syrup, have been added to particular brands of honey to increase producers’ profits.
The machine will also create a “fingerprint” for each honey sample, which will be kept in a database to help distinguish premium B.C. honey from a flood of untested, adulterated honey entering Canada from around the world.
“We’d eventually like to see it lead to a certification scheme, where producers submit their honey for testing and get a label,” said Awram, who runs Worker Bee Honey Company with his parents, Jerry and Pia Awram. “It would give security to the people buying it.”
A study published in October in Scientific Reports found evidence of global honey fraud, calling honey the world’s “third-most adulterated food.” Researchers tested 100 honey samples from 18 honey-producing countries. They discovered 27 per cent of the samples were “of questionable authenticity,” while 52 of the samples from Asia were adulterated.
The results were no surprise to Awram. He said statistics show that while the number of bees in countries such as Vietnam has not risen in the last decade, honey exports have doubled and almost tripled.
“How else do you explain that?” asked the beekeeper.
Awram’s NMR machine — one of only 12 in the world testing honey, and the only one in Canada — can scan the entire organic chemical spectrum of a honey sample, detecting fraudulent sweeteners, as well as the floral and geographic origins of the honey. By establishing a database of B.C. honey samples, he hopes to convince local and international buyers that B.C. honey is worth premium prices.
“This issue has become a crisis for our industry,” he said.
In 2003, honey was worth about $2.30 per pound. It has since fallen to about $1.50 per pound, and at one time fell to just 80 cents, less than the cost of production in Canada. While producers who are adding sweeteners to their honey can afford to sell it for less, producers who sell a pure product are finding it tough to stay in business.
“Ultimately, this method should be used worldwide to ensure that what we are calling honey is in fact honey,” said Awram.
The beekeeper plans to share his results with the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA), which is responsible for testing imported honey, but doesn’t have a NMR machine.
In an emailed statement, the CFIA confirmed it tests for C-4 sugars (from cane or corn syrup) through stable isotope ratio analysis. The agency is looking into NMR technology to detect adulteration with other sugars.
The CFIA has never found a Canadian honey adulterated with other sugars, said the statement. But testing of foreign-produced honey has found adulterated product in about six per cent of 397 samples tested so far in 2018-19. (A testing year runs from April 1-March 31.)
In 2017-18, 4.3 per cent of 243 samples were adulterated. The statement said the percentage of noncompliances “should not be considered to represent the overall adulteration of the products available to the consumer.”
The CFIA’s response when finding adulterated honey is based on a variety of factors, but can include “seizure and detention, removal orders from Canada, disposal and import lookouts for known noncompliant products or importers,” said the statement. The agency can also undertake enforcement actions, such as recommending prosecution for companies that import adulterated products.
At Worker Bee Honey Company on Thursday afternoon, stakeholders and politicians received a tour of the lab with its honey-yellow walls and stainless steel production tanks. Awram, who has a PhD in molecular biology, showed off his new machine, a white capsule topped with a tray of tiny test tubes of honey. The molecular composition of the samples was visible as a jagged red line on a nearby computer screen.
B.C. Agriculture Minister Lana Popham said one of her nicknames at the legislature is “the bee lady” and praised Awram for providing another way to put “our own provincial stamp” on the honey industry.
Awram received a $87,500 grant from the federal and provincial governments to establish his database.
“I’m a huge believer in truth in labelling,” said Popham, adding “this technology is critically important.”