Weed-killer glyphosate have been found in New Zealand honey, prompting concern for the high-value mānuka industry.
Their first round of testing took place in 2015 and 2016 and saw 300 mostly raw and unprocessed samples gathered from all over the country. They later found 67 of them, or 22.3 per cent, contained small traces of glyphosate and 5 of those, or 1.7 per cent, were over our regulatory limits.
A second test, conducted in 2018 and 2019, found traces in 11 of 60 packaged mānuka honey products available openly for sale.
An unnamed New Zealand producer began an investigation in 2018, when glyphosate was detected in its honey in an overseas retail market, and went on to find honey with glyphosate levels above New Zealand’s regulatory limits.
Their investigation into the detections found residues present in unprocessed honey at levels above the New Zealand default maximum residue limit.
The MPI study expands on this and found the contamination is likely caused by bees visiting flowering plants that have been sprayed with glyphosate. It says there is very little beekeepers can do to limit exposure as the chemical is widely used.
Beekeepers also have little practical means of excluding bees from foraging on plants treated with glyphosate.
It's tainted, and it's not the beekeepers’ fault, it's the fault of a regulatory environment that doesn't control it enough.
If New Zealand wants to be a cheap commodity producer, producing tainted food, then that's New Zealand choice, or we can actually have stronger regulation, which protects our free market.
It’s a headache for big mānuka exporters and other honey packets that have been calling honey they sell as pure when it’s actually contaminated with glyphosate. Some of these contaminated honeys sell for more than $200 a jar.
Consumers, we understand, don't want to see any residues in their honey, and neither do we.
Australia also has problems with Glyphosate contamination. We need glyphosate banned.
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