Honey sold by major brands in India adulterated with sugar syrup: CSE

The CSE also claimed that it tracked down Chinese trade portals which were advertising fructose syrup that can bypass tests to check adulteration

The Centre for Science and Environment on Wednesday released the results of an investigation that claims majority of the honey brands sold in the Indian market adulterate their nectar with some special type of sugar syrups made in China.

The CSE team purchased 13 brands of honey from the market and tested them at a National Dairy Development Board laboratory in Gujarat. Almost all the top brands (except Apis Himalaya) passed the tests of purity.

But when the same brands were examined using Nuclear Magnetic Resonance tests – used in advanced countries to check the honey adulteration - which is mandatory for honey exported from India - almost all brands failed. Out of the 13 brands tested, only three passed the NMR test, which was done by a laboratory in Germany.

Indian standards for honey purity cannot detect the adulteration because Chinese companies have designed sugar syrups to bypass such standards.

"It is a food fraud more nefarious and more sophisticated than what we found in our 2003 and 2006 investigations into soft drinks; more damaging to our health than perhaps anything that we have found till now,” said Sunita Narain, CSE director general.

Out of 22 samples tested, only five cleared all the tests. Nearly 77 per cent samples were found adulterated with sugar syrup, mostly made in China.

The CSE investigators sent emails to the Chinese companies posing as honey sellers soliciting syrups that could pass tests in India. They received replies that such syrups were indeed available and could be sent to India.

The companies informed that even if 50-80 per cent of the honey is adulterated with syrup, it would pass all stipulated tests. A sample of the syrup that can bypass tests was sent by the Chinese company as 'paint pigment' to get through customs.

The team also tracked down a factory at Jaspur in Uttarakhand that manufactures syrup to adulterate honey. The CSE team managed to procure a sample from there too.

Subsequently, the team adulterated pure honey procured from the beekeepers with the sugar syrup and sent for testing. “What was shocking to find is that adulterated samples with 25 per cent and 50 per cent sugar syrup passed the test of purity. We confirmed that sugar syrups exist that can bypass the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India’s, 2020 standards,” said Amit Khurana, programme director of CSE’s Food Safety and Toxins team.

“The business of adulteration has evolved so that it can pass the stipulated tests in India. Our concern is not just that the honey we consume is adulterated, but that this adulteration is difficult to catch. We have found that the sugar syrups are designed so that they can go undetected.”