The Authorities are Looking into It!
Laws and more regulations and more taxes. Just keep calling for more if that's what you want!
Have you seen that cartoon of a big crater in the main street with a ring of policemen standing around it? The caption reads, "........... and the police are looking into it."
We have country of origin labeling laws here in Australia, and the police are looking into them too!
We have jars of Powdered Honey on the shelf here, With an ingredients list like this: 100% Australian Honey, malto-dextrines. That could mean anything, but all I read into it is fraud, or at least misleading advertising. If we assume the text is technically correct and convert the jargon into simple language, powered honey could be 51% honey and 49% malto-dextrine (a technical name for a glucose syrup). It is light and fluffy too, so a jar full of it is cheap, but looks like a jar full of creamed honey at a cursory glance. I guess the police are looking into that jar too!
But what if there was a bit of a leak? What if we ran out of honey too early in the run? Would we change the label to read, Malto-Dextrine, 100% Australian Honey? The components are supposed to be listed in the order of their relative volumes. Or what if we got the lines mixed and some Chinese honey (oh, maybe it was Canadian!) got into the system, would we relabel the jars? Don't tickle me, those labels were printed possibly months before the jar was filled, and the only way they relate in any way to what goes into those jars is by intent. Have you heard what the Road to Hell is paved with? And the best laid plans of mice and men................ uh, how does that one go?
Another packer is marketing HONEY spread, with the word 'spread' not well featured on the label. Over the word HONEY in bold clear text, it reads '100% AUSTRALIAN.' The ingredients list (in 3 or 4 point text), reads, "Honey,water, sugar, pectin." A great product, no doubt, unless one was wanting honey, maybe to rub on his sunburn. Was the product 100%? or the bottle and label? or maybe the company that produced it? We have a policy here of "Truth in Advertising." The Authorities LOOK into it at times.
No doubt the police, industry officials, politicians, and consumer watchdogs are looking into lots of things. What a pity looking doesn't change things. We have what we call 'Royal Commissions" here too. Great talks fests indeed!
I would be studying the statistics there in Canada to verify that the production figures, the consumption figures and the importing figures are in the right columns. I occasionally read about how America is the food basket of the world, and how much honey she exports. No doubt she does export some honey, to the Bahamas, to her troops in Iceland etc., and perhaps, maybe to several small island states around about, but Arthur Anderson style accounting is still alive and well.
So Australia is Canada's second largest consumer, aye? We must be greedy little honey eaters here. Yet, not one bottle of honey have I see here that is labeled as being or containing, Canadian Honey. Would it be that an Australian company is buying that honey for processing and vending into Europe? Into the USA? What about back into Canada?
In musical chairs, the music always stops and there is never enough chairs to go 'round. Would that be the case if we tried to put gold to all the futures contracts, honey to all the statistics and assets to all the company shares? What about cash to all the Retirement Accounts, or hard assets to all the cyber money? Oh, well, we would have to ask the police to look into that too.
Figures don't lie, but Liars can figure.
Cheers and happy honey consuming!
JohnS
PS: Any worries with honey marketing? Let me have all your details and I will look into it!
One more rant, then I will desist.
Ian, Re: Msg. 101,
Plenty of thoughts, but no hard data. I was told that same company has packing plants in Argentina as well. I doubt if much Australian honey goes into North America owing to your preference for light flavor, but specialty lines of Eucalypt for the connoisseurs’ market may be bigger than I think. There are certainly a lot of Aussies living in California. I doubt if much white honey is required to come back in to Australia, as our average shelf pack will need lots of eucalypt flavor to fly well. In short seasons, mind you, some white would be welcome to soften the darker/stronger flavored grades. Mostly, I assume that company sells the bulk of its Australian input (mixed with what? only the gods would know) into Europe as Organic Honey, at considerably better prices. The Europeans are really hooked on that word Organic.
Jean-Marc (105)
For sure, honey is like gold, in as much as it circumnavigates the planet in the effort to reduce the impact of shortages and rising production costs. Traceability and proof of authenticity is scarcely possible. The paper trail and the official approvals at best looks like just another ‘license to cheat.’ In the case of gold, who cares? In the case of honey, Who Cares? If it were not for the lies we are fed about the honey market, even the beekeepers probably wouldn’t be so concerned about honey’s travels.
Re: 103/4,
The big advantage the world’s buyers had in Argentina for so long was that the beekeepers there thought they were getting better prices for their honey owing to the inflation of their currency. Now that the inflation bubble has burst there, the farmers are a bit more awake. Anyone asleep in North America? There are plenty asleep here in Australia. They don’t realize that despite the rising dollar value of their honey, they are still losing margin.
If you want a really good price for your honey sell it to Zimbabwe! You could be a millionaire overnight!
Allend (108),
Right ON! China is the best market for honey in the world! Owing to the length of time their society has been established, their beekeepers have been letting standards slip (for hundreds of years?) to the point where now, their honey is almost inedible to my taste too.
One main flaw is that they don’t let the honey ripen in the comb. At times (if my information is correct) they spin the combs on a daily basis. This unripened nectar ferments, the honey granulates rapidly and the syrup may be sold off locally from the top of the keg. This part I have seen with my own eyes. The Chinese poor cannot afford to eat honey any more so than the Americans can afford to hold gold. As an international commodity (much in demand, I might add) a pail of honey can cost many a price equal to a weeks wages.
However, despite popular beliefs, China has more rich people than any other nation. So if only 1% of them were offered good honey from your country or mine, I am sure they would go for it in a big way.
Another aside of interest, is that when you see a Chinese population in San Francisco (for instance) you may not notice that a percentage of them are constantly being recycled back through China. The point here is that quite a number of the Chinese in China have traveled and lived elsewhere and know what honey is supposed to be.
It was reported in ‘Lonely Planet’ that no Chinese person has ever died in the UK, according to the births, deaths and marriages records. This is overstated, I am sure, but wait for it: The passports are constantly being mailed back to China! You can’t help but love the Chinese. They are the world’s masters at keeping their mouths shut while they get on with the business of prospering. Many centuries of oppressive governmental burdens have taught them this.
Governmental burdens? What’s that?
Cheers,
JohnS
John Smith , please keep your "rants" COMING
Capalinao had trouble blending out the nitofurons a couple of years ago in their Argentina packing plants.If I remember correctly some of the tainted stuff ended up in Canada.
What does Eucalyptest honey sell for or pay the beekeeper in Aussie land? I think the taste may have been Capilano's downfall in Canada, that and the effort to be the cheapest product on a couple of grocery store chain shelfs broke them.
Heard BeeMaids Chinese market was a couple of container loads every 2 months....... be a long time emptying the Canadian honey crop at that rate........ this may or may not be true.
Irwin
Got no quarrel with those that sell for less........................they obviously know what their stuff is worth
at 1.60 /lb Canadian funds
http://calc.customhouse.com/ratecalc...6&refCurr=USD&
1.60can =1.27USD........... plus freight ,plus duty............ US or European packer getting a steal of a deal
or
[url]http://www.xe.com/
Live rates at 2009.02.17 00:21:33 UTC
1.60 CAD= 1.28715USD
Canada Dollars United States Dollars
1 CAD = 0.804469 USD 1 USD = 1.24306 CAD
That cheap 1.25USD Canadian honey
"We can get all the Canadian honey we want delivered for $1.25, but we don't want to leave out the US beekeeper". Nice of him, eh?
That cheap 1.25- 1.28USD Canadian honey
is rapidly evaporating............should be all gone by now.............only higher priced honey left, me thinks
I wonder how much the depression has crushed or shrunk demand IF AT all.......
Packers and brokers are playing the game well........... get as much now, as cheap as possible , cause down the road honey is going to be more costly.Bet they are all carrying short inventories infear of worse things to come in the economy
