Why is Honey so expensive?

[SimSimmer69]

Not a single straight answer to the question.

Honey is expensive because:

1. It's difficult to extract and bottle. Not everyone can become a good bee-keeper.
2. It's time consuming and not an exact science. My cousin was a bee-keeper and it wasn't guaranteed his hive would have honey at any time
3. It's the only food that doesn't spoil. A bottle of honey would remain on your shelf until you turn old and probably die.

[Dizzy28]

^ #3 is not a reason why it is expensive just merely a property of honey. In fact having an indefinite shelf life should make it cheaper as there is no wastage through expiry. Inventory can be built up without fear of having to dispose of it in a year's time as with other food items.

Simple answer why honey is expensive is demand and supply. Demand has grown over time but supply hasn't for several reasons including Bees are under threat from pesticides and Loss of flowers for nectar collection through the activities of man.

The market for Honey is also closed i.e. it is illegal to import honey so our supply is constrained by what is produced locally.
Recently heard one of the Deputy Comptroller of Customs say that the black market trade in honey in Trinidad is now more profitable than the contraband scotch whiskey market.

[humbleservant]

Honey is illegal to import because there is a disease affecting bees globally that causes the entire hive to die. It can be spread through contaminated honey, and we do not have testing facilities locally to properly inspect and test imported honey.

One reason why honey is expensive is because the equipment costs keep increasing.
Frames, hives, tools and equipment need annual maintenance. One would not expect the amount of items that are used in bee-keeping.

Labour rates have also gone up, and harvesting/maintaining large bee colonies is difficult for one person to do.

Basically the cost of running and maintaining a proper honey business has increased, thus causing the selling price to increase.

It takes a lot of work to produce good quality honey, and with the rate of deforestation and climate change, bee-keeping is becoming more challenging.

Just my 2 cents.

[pete]

What's the name of this disease? Foodstuff being imported has to get a health certificate from the country of origin where they should test for it before and it can be exported. I guess if someone wanted to introduce the testing locally so that honey could be imported the farmers would stand up against it though.

[Redman]

http://www.vanishingbees.com/

Its on Netflix .....
its pretty incredible.

[Dizzy28]

What's the name of this disease? Foodstuff being imported has to get a health certificate from the country of origin where they should test for it before and it can be exported. I guess if someone wanted to introduce the testing locally so that honey could be imported the farmers would stand up against it though.

The importation of honey has been prohibited even before any global bee disease. The Apiaries Act is 1935 and as far as I am aware it has only been amended in 1949.

The act states that

PART IV
RESTRICTIONS ON THE IMPORTATION OF BEES,
BEE SUPPLIES AND BEE PRODUCTS
21.
(1) The importation of honey and beeswax, other than
beeswax included in manufactured articles, is prohibited except
as provided in this regulation

I would think legislative changes to allow for importation would come before the honey testing lab or else why would they set up the lab knowing the honey can't be bought in anyhow.

[EFFECTIC DESIGNS]

$159.99 for a 750ml bottle is a fair price assuming its pure.

[desifemlove]

supply and demand. not many people own bees. And I doubt we import that much. we does have no industrial scale honey-making.