Regardless of the possibility that there may be areas disqualifying organic certification within the large “forage zone” defined by the organic certifying bodies, this doesn’t mean that the bees foraged nectar in this area at all, or when they were collecting the nectar that went into any given jar of honey.  Furthermore, due to their natural physiology, honeybees are remarkably efficient at filtering most possible contaminants so that they aren’t expressed into the honey. The purity of our honey is constantly confirmed by dozens of 3rd party laboratory tests each year.

Our bulk honey, like honey from any other honey producer supplying honey packaging companies (remember that we are beekeepers first and that the majority of honey produced on our farm is sold in bulk to other brands that blend it to raise the quality of their product), is routinely tested by third party laboratories as a condition of sale to the packaging company. Our retail Wendell Estate Honey, the finest honey our bees produce in a season, has been tested repeatedly as we export it and enter it into honey quality contests. These tests measure contaminants such as herbicide and pesticide residues, a long list of antibiotics and adulteration with sugar syrups in addition to heavy metals. The results always show that our honey is as clean and pure as any organic honey out there: completely free from pesticides, antibiotics, heavy metals, and sugar syrups.

Legitimate organic certification decreases the chance that there is an added harmful contaminant like a pesticide, antibiotic, heavy metal in the honey, increasing the food safety of the organic product. Heath benefits of raw honey on the other hand are conferred by the presence of natural substances within the honey, whether the honey meets organic certification standards or not. These beneficial substances come either from the flowers that the bees gather the nectar from or are added by the bees themselves while they transform the nectar into honey.

While organic honey has a lower chance of containing harmful contaminants, raw non-organic honey confers similar health benefits as raw organic honey. In fact, non-certified real raw honey is indisputably higher in health benefits than pasteurized, processed organic honey since the processing removes or destroys many of the substances which give raw honey its health benefits.

The commendable motivation for purchasing organic foods to support more environmentally favorable agricultural practices has decreased effect in the case of buying organic honey.

Organic certification of honey depends on the agricultural management of circular area, called a buffer zone, of more than 28 km² (>10 square miles) centered on the beehives. Up to 54 “quarter-section” fields may be wholly or partially within this buffer zone. These fields are managed by up to dozens of different farmers, companies and/or landowners. If even one of these land managers uses a proscribed substance like a pesticide or herbicide or other proscribed chemical, or seeds a GMO crop on even a single field within the buffer zone, all of the honey produced by that bee yard is excluded from legitimate organic certification. Towns, villages, golf courses and parks all routinely use substances that would preclude legitimate organic certification of honey produced by bees located within 3km (1.8 miles).

Many of these countries are not known for rigorous, transparent, fair government certification agencies. However both COR and USDA recognize organic certifications from many other countries. On the commodity market, the price of bulk “organic” honey imported from countries such as Brazil, Mexico and India, the source of much of North America’s organic honey, is lower than the price of non-organic honey produced in North America. Brands often buy this cheap, foreign-certified organic honey, import it in bulk, blend and package it domestically and the label it (usually legitimately by current CFIA and USDA regulations) as “USDA Organic” or “COR Organic”.

These private organic certifying agencies are mandated to base certification on COR regulations. But being independent for-profit companies, there’s a conflicting incentive for them to certify more producers as organic in order to increase revenue from certifying fees. The Canadian certifying agencies operate at different levels of rigor, so it could be worth looking into which certifying body has certified your organic food products.

Canadian producers that have COR organic certification, can apply for USDA certification based on the fact that the USDA recognizes COR certification, even though the USDA has no formal guidelines for certification of domestic honey produced by American beekeepers. In fact the vast majority (arguably all) legitimately labeled USDA Organic honey is imported from foreign countries.