It looks like honey, tastes like honey and may even smell like floral woodland honey, but at least 50 per cent isn't the real thing. At least not when it reaches you on a retailer's shelf.
Many unsuspecting Kenyans are consuming highly adulterated honey that could have serious health implications and economic consequences.
Top honey expert at the National Beekeeping Institute in Nairobi Newton Kariuki confirmed on Sunday that random samples from honey retailers countrywide confirmed that quality had been "highly compromised".
Kariuki, who is the head of training at the institute, said as much as 30 per cent of honey delivered for testing was found to be substandard compromised in quality or adulterated.
He did not elaborate. The honey might be diluted with sugar water, molasses or be impure in other ways, containing unhealthy sutstances..
“But the honey we receive for tests is from people of goodwill who want to establish if the honey they have is of the right quality. So the situation out there is likely to be worse. I do not want to give you some of the random checks we normally make out there because they might sound outrageous,” he told the Star on the phone.
Going by the random unannounced checks by the institution, he said, it was suspected that over 50 per cent of honey sold to Kenyans was adulterated. “However, that is something we need to go out and corroborate," he said.
The honey expert spoke after Kitui Governor Charity Ngilu on Friday raised concern that high-quality honey sourced from Kitui went to the market highly adulterated.
thus urged the Kenya Bureau of Standards and other government authorities to get rid of the inferior or contaminated honey that has found its way into all leading chain stores in the country.
"Let those who are selling molasses and other things in the name of honey brand it as such but not to call it pure honey. Sadly, others are going to the extent of labelling it as pure Kitui honey," the governor said.
Her comments were read by the value addition specialist in her office Temi Mutia. She spoke during the closing of an applied training on beekeeping for farmers from Kitui at the National Beekeeping Station.
Ngilu urged Kebs and other authorities to carry out raids similar to those on supermarkets where meat was found to be meat was laced with chemicals and preservatives.
Edited by R.Wamochie
