hONEY
Top 5 reasons you should buy honey directly from beekeepers
If you want real and pure honey then skip the big brands and go to the beekeeper.
Did you know the honey you pick up from a store, thinking it’s pure, might be adulterated? Or you might even have been consuming impure honey all this while?
If you want to taste the real and pure honey then you should buy it from the source — the beekeeper. Here are the top reasons why you need to replace the big honey brands with your local beekeeper when it comes to buying honey and related products like wax, pollen, royal jelly etc.
1. Purity
The biggest reason you should buy honey from a beekeeper is of course to ensure the purity of honey. Let’s first understand the honey supply chain and how honey is adulterated in India.
Honey production is seasonal and depends upon the flora at a particular time of the year. The honey produced by beekeepers is bought at cheaper rates by middlemen, also known as traders, who further sell it to the big brand honey companies and exporters at higher rates.
Most experts believe that the adulteration happens at this point. The greedy companies adulterate pure honey with corn syrup or sugar syrup to maximize their profits. According to experts, honey adulterated with syrup tastes and smells like real honey only and it’s difficult to tell the difference unless tested in advanced laboratories.
Rajesh Jakhar, who heads one of the biggest associations of beekeepers in India, told the Times of India that this is precisely why big brand honey companies are reluctant in buying honey from beekeepers at fair rates. Jakhar claims that adulterated honey has as much as 80% syrup and 20% honey.
While companies buy honey, for example mustard honey, from middlemen, at an average rate of more than Rs 150 per kg but get sugar or corn syrup at much lesser rates of Rs 40 to Rs 50 per kg. It’s clear what gives greedy companies higher profit. Adulteration.
According to a report in The Guardian, the widespread fraud in the global supply change of honey is a huge cause of concern. The Centre for Science and Environment had also stated in 2020 that Indian honey companies were importing synthetic sugar syrups from China for adulterating honey and showed how 10 of the 14 Indian big brands had failed the purity test.
So, when you buy honey from a beekeeper, you remove the supply chain and ensure that what you are purchasing is not adulterated and harmful to your health. So don’t get lured by big fake advertisement campaigns run by fraudulent honey companies and stick to your beekeeper.
2. Raw, unprocessed and healthier honey
Unlike big companies, which sell processed honey, you get raw and unprocessed honey from beekeepers. Raw honey is not heated and just slightly filtered and due to its natural form retains all the enzymes, antioxidants, vitamins, the natural taste and anti-bacterial properties.
On the other hand, processed honey is filtered and heated and loses all its natural properties in the process. Processed honey may even be adulterated with sugar or corn syrup as I said earlier.
The bottom line raw and processed honey is healthier and tastier and only a beekeeper can provide you that.
3. Unblended honey
Unlike big companies, which sell processed honey, you get raw and unprocessed honey from beekeepers. Raw honey is not heated and just slightly filtered and due to its natural form retains all the enzymes, antioxidants, vitamins, the natural taste and anti-bacterial properties.
On the other hand, processed honey is filtered and heated and loses all its natural properties in the process. Processed honey may even be adulterated with sugar or corn syrup as I said earlier.
The bottom line raw and processed honey is healthier and tastier and only a beekeeper can provide you that.
4. Fresh honey
If you want fresh honey then look no farther than your beekeeper. The honey production is seasonal and depends on the flowering cycles of nectar sources.
You can always buy freshly produced honey from a beekeeper depending upon the flowering seasons. For example, in Kullu in Himachal Pradesh, honey flow season comes in May and June and then again in September and October. You can buy fresh honey in these two seasons.
However, big companies store the honey they buy and release their products according to market demands. Such a honey can’t be fresh.
5. Apiary visits and enquiries
If you want fresh honey then look no farther than your beekeeper. The honey production is seasonal and depends on the flowering cycles of nectar sources.
You can always buy freshly produced honey from a beekeeper depending upon the flowering seasons. For example, in Kullu in Himachal Pradesh, honey flow season comes in May and June and then again in September and October. You can buy fresh honey online from the Wildcone also. Visit out shop here.
However, big companies store the honey they buy and release their products according to market demands. Such a honey can’t be fresh.
