The European Anti-Fraud Office (OLAF) provided investigative support and on-the-spot checks in an EU action against honey adulteration led by the European Commission.
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‘From the hives’ was an EU coordinated action led by the European Commission’s Directorate-General for Health and Food Safety (DG SANTE), with the national authorities of 18 countries who are part of the EU Food Fraud Network, OLAF and the European Commission’s Joint Research Centre (JRC).
Honey naturally contains sugars and, according to EU legislation, must remain pure – meaning that it cannot have ingredients added to it. Adulteration occurs when ingredients such as water or inexpensive sugar syrups are artificially added to increase the volume of honey.
While the risk for human health is considered as low, such practices defraud consumers and put honest producers in jeopardy as they face unfair competition from operators who can slash prices thanks to illicit, cheap ingredients.
For example: the EU average unit value for imported honey was 2.32 €/kg in 2021, whereas sugar syrups made from rice were at around 0.40 – 0.60 €/kg.
‘From the hives’ targeted imports of honey into the EU.
Suspicious import or export operators were identified thanks to an initial phase of collection of samples of honey at border points of entry in participating countries, and thanks to a second phase of intelligence-gathering supported by OLAF.
As a third phase, national authorities and OLAF carried out investigations at places of import, processing, blending, and packing on suspicious consignments.
Ville Itälä, Director-General of OLAF, said: "The key word was teamwork.The European Commission’s Directorate-General for Health and Food Safety initiated and coordinated the entire action.
"OLAF investigated to help identify suspicious operators, performed on-the-spot checks with national authorities, acquired and analysed computer and phone records.
"Colleagues at the JRC analysed samples collected at borders in their laboratories to detect adulteration. National authorities were, as always, on the front line of checks and investigations on the ground.
"OLAF has investigated international food fraud before and I am very glad that we could lend our experience.The EU is an importer of honey as the internal demand is higher than our domestic production. It is important that we remain vigilant against any abuse.
"The most frequent type of fraud with honey happens via adulteration, meaning by adding cheap ingredients instead of keeping the honey pure. But we also found instances of origin fraud, with labels claiming false origins of the product. This action served to raise attention, call for order, and deter any fraudulent practices.’’
During the EU coordinated action, 133 businesses (70 importers and 63 exporters) were found to be involved in consignments of honey suspected of being adulterated. A further 44 operators have been investigated to date, many of them thanks to OLAF. OLAF’s investigation detected various types of fraud, including adulteration.
The participating countries were: Belgium, Bulgaria, Czechia, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, Spain, and Sweden, as well as Norway and Switzerland.
The coordinated action confirmed the initial assumption that a significant part of honey imported into the EU is suspicious of not complying with the provisions of the “Honey Directive†(46% based on 320 samples).
This rate was considerably higher than the one obtained in 2015-17 (14%).
The highest absolute number of suspicious consignments originated from China (74%), although honey originating from Turkey had the highest relative proportion of suspicious samples (93%).
Honey imported from the United Kingdom had an even higher suspicion rate (100%), likely the result of honey produced in other countries and further blended in the UK before its re-export to the EU.
More than half (57%) of the operators had exported honey consignments suspicious of being adulterated with extraneous sugars and more than 60% (66), of the operators imported at least one suspicious consignment.
To date, 44 EU operators have been investigated and seven have been sanctioned.
Forensic investigations undertaken by Member States and OLAF based on on-site inspection, sampling and close examination of computers and phone records demonstrated complicity between exporters and importers and the following malpractices:
• use of sugar syrups to adulterate honey and lower its price, both in non-EU countries and onto the EU territory
• analysis in accredited laboratories to adapt honey/sugar blends to elude possible detection by clients and official authorities before import operations
• use of additives and colourings to adulterate the true honey botanical source
• masking of the true geographical origin of honey by forging traceability information and by removing pollens.
Based on the above, there is a strong suspicion that a large part of the honey imported from non-EU countries and found suspicious by the JRC of being adulterated remains present and undetected on the EU market.
The European Commission has already reinforced the EU import requirements by placing an authenticity requirement responsibility for the exporting countries in the certificate that accompanies imported honey (Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2022/36).
The Commission also engaged with competent authorities of exporting countries. All the countries concerned have been notified of the results of the EU coordinated action and asked to conduct investigations and sanction confirmed frauds appropriately. ■
Honey naturally contains sugars and, according to EU legislation, must remain pure – meaning that it cannot have ingredients added to it. Adulteration occurs when ingredients such as water or inexpensive sugar syrups are artificially added to increase the volume of honey.