National Honey Bee Breeding Strategy 2024-2029
In all livestock industries, genetic selection has been used to increase animal productivity and, by extension, enterprise profitability. The Australian honey bee industry is no...
HONEY BEE & POLLINATION
Project Summary: Verifying the origin of Australian honeys by analysis of their pollen content
5 pages
Published: 9 Nov 2018
Author(s): Dr Kale Sniderman
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Australia’s honey industry currently does not have an independent basis for verifying the authenticity of honey, both in terms of its geographic origin, and its botanical origin. This project aimed to gather and analyse data on the pollen content of a wide range of geographically representative, unprocessed Australian honey samples, in order to examine whether it would be feasible to use pollen analysis to verify the origin, at continental scale, of Australian honeys. This knowledge should help efforts to expand markets for Australian honey, both domestically and for export. In addition, the project also aimed to provide basic knowledge of the foraging preferences of honey bees in Australia, which has never been examined systematically through analysis of honey.
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