HIGH RISE HONEY!-WHAT IS IT?

Can any one imagine producing honey among the concrete jungles of vast sprawling cities spread all over this world in different countries? Possibly the answer may be a resounding no! But Australia is in the forefront to debunk this conventional belief and it has been shown time and again that better quality honey can be produced in urban townships than that in rural areas! In cities like Sydney there appears to be great enthusiasm by the citizenry to go for honey production on their roofs and amazingly the fear about bee sting does not bother them a wee bit. According to Beehive experts honey bees do not harm humans as they are least interested in them and gentle handling will ensure safe honey extraction from their hives. It appears the infectious enthusiasm about urban honey production seems to be spreading fast to other cities in the world like London, Paris etc and soon Urban Honey Beehives may become a parallel activity to urban agriculture and gardens which are growing day by day. Here is a take on this interesting phenomenon which deserves kudos from all nature loving people of the world. 

It might seem counter-intuitive but cities are perfect for beekeeping, Burton says. "Urban bees tend to do better than country bees because people have so many exotic trees and flowers in their gardens, so there's always something flowering in the city," she says. "In the country most of the land is used for farming, which means forage tends to be less diverse." In the cities however, even hives within a few kilometres of one another can produce honey with distinctly different tastes. The honey Burton harvests from hives in Elizabeth Bay, for example, is sweet and floral, whereas the honey from Fassnidge's hives in Paddington – less than two kilometres away – has a richer, earthier flavour. Doug Purdie, who splits his days between a marketing job and his real love, the Urban Beehive business, says interest in urban beekeeping has leapt significantly in recent years. "When I started [three years ago], there were no hives on restaurants or cafes. There were in Melbourne but as far as I know, the first in Sydney was the one we put on the Swissotel," he says. Today, Purdie and his business partner manage 55 hives in Sydney, including at Cornersmith cafe in Marrickville, Chez Dee in Potts Point, Wine Library in Woollahra and Berta in the city.

It may be logical to expect such initiative from consumers who are fed up of commercial agriculture because of safety fears and adverse environmental impact, especially on the weather conditions that contribute to global warming. Locavore movement which is spreading fast these days encourages urban beehive operations as the honey produced will have minimum carbon foot print. China and India are the biggest producers of honey and recent scandals about antibiotic tainted and pesticide contaminated honey from China  are not easy to forget for a long time to come. Here are three cheers for the adventurous, courageous and nature loving citizens living in different cities of the world for their efforts to save honey bees and coax them to give high quality and safe honey year in and year out!

V.H.POTTY
http://vhpotty.blogspot.com/
http://foodtechupdates.blogspot.com

"COUNTERFEIT" FOODS-A GLOBALLY ROARING BUSINESS!

Cheating the consumer for making a fast buck is a universal phenomenon, whether in India, China or the US. While consumers can absorb occasional sub-par quality products marketed by some unscrupulous players, it assumes critical dimension when such foods can pose serious health hazards. For example adding water to milk is not directly dangerous
but concocting a milk look alike product made from urea, detergents etc can be really reprehensible and indefensible.
It is interesting that most risky foods churned out by fraudsters posing health risks are more prevalent in developing countries like India while counterfeit foods with doubtful quality are seen more in developed countries. This may probably due to more efficient surveillance and modern infrastructure seen in wealthy countries. According to a recent study economic fraud is more prevalent globally with high priced products like olive oil, saffron, honey etc though mass consumed products do not lag very much behind. Here is an informative piece of report on the subject.  

"Some fear higher world food prices are making food counterfeiting the next big global trend. Counterfeit food is a way to steal millions and put food safety at extreme risk. Obviously, anyone willing to rip off valued brands or products to manufacture counterfeit food outside of any the regulation of any country does not give a rip about food safety. Interpol Police have recently turned up candy bards, fish, cheese, and tomato sauce—all phony—foods that could have ended up in the U.S. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has its own police force for tackling fraudulent foods and drugs. Counterfeit drugs get most of the attention. The World Bank says consumers pay $30 billion annually for fake drugs with Africa being the hardest. Estimates for how much consumers pay for fake food are a little more fluid. At last month's 9th Annual Anti-Counterfeiting and Brand Protection Summit held in Midtown West, NY, a fact sheet from DuPont said counterfeiting cost U.S. businesses $200 billion to $250 billion annually, affecting 92 percent of Fortune 500 companies. Food and beverages are only a slice of that, of course, but consider that Russia has documented $3.3 billion in annual losses due just to counterfeit vodka, the total for food and beverage products would probably be staggering".

If the above report is to be believed the cost of counterfeiting branded foods and drugs is staggering with many major brand owners suffering financially from this under-ground activities of fraudsters. More concerned should be the consumers who are cheated out of their hard earned money by enticing them to buy cheaper foods. Can this criminal activity ever be stopped? Probably not as many experts believe that it would be a logistical nightmare if taken up seriously and it is impossible to eliminate frauds completely. A possible option could be to increase the severity of punishment meted out to the food fraudsters such a way it has a strong deterrent effect on those contemplating committing such frauds.

V.H.POTTY
http://vhpotty.blogspot.com/
http://foodtechupdates.blogspot.com

BOTTULISM POISONING- HOW CRITICAL IT IS?

Food poisoning by bacteria is occurring with sickening regularity in almost all parts of the world, though such incidences are more accurately documented in the western world. Whether it is the greater immunity enjoyed by the population in poorer countries against food-borne pathogenic infection or it is lack of proper documentation very few poisoning episodes are reported from these countries. It is but natural that many wealthy countries raise their guard against food poisoning through elaborate safety regimes with high tech diagnostic facilities put in place at great cost. Recently there was a food poisoning scare due to botulism, a rare occurrence these days when canning as a food preservation method is not practiced widely. Here are a few bits of information about the dangers posed by the dreaded bacteria Clostridium botulinum, an anaerobic organism found in improperly canned food products. 

"1. Food borne botulism is caused by eating foods that contain the botulism toxin and is often associated with home-canned foods that have been improperly processed. Ingesting botulism toxin can lead to illness within a few hours- to days. Food borne botulism is often caused from home-canned foods with low acid content such as asparagus, green beans, beets and corn.
2. Wound botulism is caused by toxin produced from a wound infected with the bacterium. Wound botulism can be prevented by promptly seeking medical care for infected wounds and by not using contaminated injectable drugs.
3. Infant botulism is caused by consuming the spores of the botulinum bacteria, which then grow in the intestines and release toxin. Honey can contain spores of the botulinum bacteria and has been a source of infection for infants. Children less than 12 months old should not be fed honey. Generally, honey is safe for people one year of age and older.


The classic symptoms of botulism include double or blurred vision, drooping eyelids, slurred speech, difficulty swallowing, dry mouth, and muscle weakness. These are all symptoms of the muscle paralysis caused by the bacterial toxin. If untreated, these symptoms may progress to cause paralysis of the arms, legs, trunk and breathing muscles. In food borne botulism, symptoms generally begin 12 to 36 hours after eating a contaminated food, but they can occur as early as six hours or as late as 10 days later".

Food canning has survived in countries like the US in spite of many new technologies emerging during the last 3 decades. Canning is also practiced by many house holds under less than optimal conditions and most cases of botulism are reported from this sector. It is reported that in the US, on an average, about 145 cases of botulism occur each year but only 15 percent is due to ingestion of improper foods while 65 percent are infant botulism, rest being wound botulism. Recent studies in the US also indicate that outbreaks of food borne botulism involving two or more people occur almost every year and are usually caused by eating improperly processed home-canned foods. Utmost precaution against botulism whether food borne or from other sources is necessary to avoid unnecessary fatalities. In most developing countries more attention is focused on Clostridium tetani which causes a great number of infectious episodes through wounds, especially caused by rusted iron materials like nails, implements, knives etc.and many urban children are immunized against this infection during early days of their life. 

V.H.POTTY
http://vhpotty.blogspot.com/
http://foodtechupdates.blogspot.com

FOOD ADULTERATION-A UNIVERSAL THREAT TO CONSUMERS

The hapless citizens in India can take solace from a recent scholarly report about fraudulent practices adopted by manufacturers of foods world over to get economic benefits at the expense of the consumer. One is familiar with the famous saying of one of the past prime ministers of India describing corruption as universal and not confined to India. Same appears to be true with food adulteration also. It is surprising that the fraudsters are always one step ahead of the safety agencies when it comes to detecting adulteration and their techniques are increasingly becoming more and more sophisticated with time. Food frauds literally constitute a high tech industry because of the enormous economic gains inherent in adulteration. Interestingly costlier the food product, more incentive is available for evolving appropriate methods to mimic the original product with cheap alternatives.Here is a gist of the report that elaborates on economic frauds perpetrated in the US based on reliable data base. 

"Olive oil, milk, honey, saffron, orange juice, coffee and apple juice are the seven most likely food ingredients to be targets for intentional or economically motivated adulteration of food, or food fraud, according to analysis of the first U.S. public database created to compile information on risk factors for food fraud published in the Journal of Food Science. The database was created by the U.S. Pharmacopeial Convention (USP) and provides baseline information to assist interested parties in assessing the risks of specific products. It includes a total of 1,305 records for food fraud based on a total of 667 scholarly, media and other publicly available reports. Food fraud is a collective term that encompasses the deliberate substitution, addition, tampering or misrepresentation of food, food ingredients or food packaging, or false or misleading statements made about a product for economic gain. A more specific type of fraud is the fraudulent addition of non-authentic substances or removal or replacement of authentic substances without the purchaser's knowledge for economic gain of the seller. According to the authors of the paper, food fraud may be more risky than traditional threats to the food supply because the adulterants used in these activities often are unconventional and designed to avoid detection through routine analyses. "The vast majority of food fraud is primarily technical and economical," said John Spink, associate director with the anti-counterfeiting and product protection program at Michigan State University. "However, there are some cases where there can be serious health consequences as illustrated when melamine was added to infant formula and pet food in order to falsify the level of protein content in these products."

When it comes to food adulteration no other country can beat India because this is a country where every one has unlimited freedom to indulge in such activities with no possibility of retribution. Though food laws that exist are comparable to international ones, there is very little activity at the ground level to monitor or detect adulterated foods in the market or punish the guilty. Milk is mentioned as one of the top adulterated products but can any country beat the ingenuity of the Indian fraudsters in evolving a milk completely without a cow or a buffalo, using ingredients like detergents, urea, cheap oil etc that competes with genuine milk in the market with complete impunity? Of course Chinese may be providing close competition by using the deadly Melamine to increase protein values in milk for economic gains! Saffron is another commodity that attracts fraudsters like the honey beckoning the bees! Consumers are invariably advised by well meaning pundits that they should go for branded foods marketed by established food manufacturers but it is like asking people to eat cake if bread is not affordable! Besides almost all commodities that do not undergo any significant are not available in the branded format from reputed industry players. There does not appear to be any lasting solution to this vexed problem. Stringent punishment to proven fraudsters in double quick time, if made the hall mark of the food safety regime, may see a decline in adulteration cases significantly. A separate and dedicated food fraud court stream under the judiciary for fast tracking such cases may also have a deterrent effect.  

V.H.POTTY
http://vhpotty.blogspot.com/
http://foodtechupdates.blogspot.com