Insights into bee biology could ease US rules for organic honey

Insights into bee biology could ease US rules for organic honey Gaby Clark Scientific Editor Robert Egan Senior Editor Strict regulations have prevented continental U.S. beekeepers from participating in the lucrative organic honey market, but new research finds that bees' actual habits make certain rules too extreme. The findings potentially provide evidence for federal agencies to ease restrictions and open organic markets to U.S. producers. "Consumers are willing to pay 20% to 30% more for certified organic honey than nonorganic honey," said Scott McArt, associate professor of entomology in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences and a senior author of the new study, published in the journal Science of the Total Environment. "If organic honey was possible to produce in the continental U.S., it would open up a huge market for our country's beekeepers, who are really struggling right now." Current organic certification guidelines set by the U.S. Department of Agriculture require apiaries to have a 6.4-kilometer (close to 4-mile) buffer zone of certified organic or natural land for bees to forage. Additionally, the Food and Drug Administration has set standards for pesticide contamination, called maximum residue limits, that U.S. organic honey products must meet. It is very hard to find a 6.4-kilometer radius of fully certified organic or natural land in the continental U.S., McArt said. The policy has effectively closed markets to the country's beekeepers, except for three producers in Hawaii. As a result, the U.S. imports most organic honey from foreign countries, such as Brazil. Bees forage closer to home In the new study, the authors produced honey with pesticide contamination comparable to certified organic honey by applying organic colony management practices on farms where natural and seminatural habitats dominated the surrounding landscape. Furthermore, related work by the project team tracked bees from their hives to see how far they typically travel when they forage. They determined that the bees' median foraging distance was closer to 750 meters (about 2,500 feet), far less than the organic guidelines require. "Our research shows that beekeepers in the Northeastern U.S. may only need a small fraction of that land to produce honey with pesticide contamination as low as imported USDA organic honey," said Ben DeMoras '22, M.S. '25, the paper's first author. "One in five beekeepers already manage their hives with organic methods, so with revised organic standards, many could still benefit economically," said DeMoras, who worked in McArt's lab while conducting this research and is currently a doctoral student at the Auburn University Bee Center in Auburn, Alabama. How the team tested honey Those existing organic methods require beekeepers to prevent devastating Varroa mites by treating their colonies with naturally occurring organic compounds—such as organic acids or concentrated hops from India pale ale beer—that don't leave beeswax combs or honey with long-term chemical residues. Conventional colonies are commonly treated with the chemical insecticide amitraz to prevent Varroa mites, the most damaging honey bee pest and the main cause of colony collapse. U.S. beekeepers lost 56% of their colonies in 2024 and 39% last year due to colony deaths. Chemical residues, often from amitraz, can get stored long term in honeycomb wax, which is the most energetically costly part of a hive for bees to produce, so beekeepers reuse it year after year. To follow organic processes, a hive's wax combs must be built by bees in certified organic conditions so they don't contain chemical residues. In the study, DeMoras and colleagues began with empty boxes in 2023 and then added bees. By the following year, the bees had built new wax honeycombs and colonies began producing honey. The team established 72 colonies using organic management practices on six large organic farms in the Northeast to test whether organic farms in this region provided sufficient forage for organic honey production. Over a 3-kilometer (about 1.9-mile) radius, each colony was surrounded by land that was between 56% and 93% natural (such as forests or wetlands) or seminatural (often fallow farm fields). In 2024, the team screened the honey the bees produced for 96 pesticide residues at the Cornell Chemical Ecology Core Facility and compared it with 20 store-bought brands of organic and conventional honey. Clean honey on smaller farms "When we looked at the pesticide residues in the honey produced from those colonies compared to the certified organic imports and certified organic Hawaiian honey, they were low and comparable," McArt said, with only one Northeastern sample exceeding maximum residue limits. Residue levels from conventional honey were much higher. "This study demonstrates that it is possible to produce clean honey that could meet the standards for USDA organic certification in the continental U.S., even though the apiaries were placed on relatively small organic farms," said Margarita López-Uribe, Ph.D. '14, associate professor of entomology at Pennsylvania State University and a senior author of the study. In next steps, the researchers hope to expand these tests to other parts of the country. Publication details Benedict X. DeMoras et al, Pesticide contamination in honey from organically managed colonies in the continental USA is comparable to certified organic imports, Science of The Total Environment (2026). DOI: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2026.182049 Journal information: Science of the Total Environment Provided by Cornell University