'02 Texas honey prices are exceptionally sweet

By KRISTY HEMMINGSEN | East Texas Edition

November 28, 2002 -- As the holiday season approaches, many Texas residents are heating up the kitchen by baking their favorite seasonal treats. And one important ingredient often used to create such goodies is golden sweet honey produced right here in the Lone Star State.

Honey continues to grow as a very productive commodity for Texas beekeepers.

In particular this year, Tim Burleson of Burleson Honey (a honey packaging company in Waxahachie) said 2002 has been a remarkable year for Texas honey producers.

"We received some of the highest prices ever in 1995 through 1996," stated Burleson. "But this year, prices have reached heights higher than those years ever did. In fact, it's been the highest price for honey ever on record in Texas."

Burleson explained some of the contributing factors to the high prices in Texas are due to the overall poor weather conditions in the rest of the nation. "We have seen some of this bad weather," he said. "But, we still have had it better than everyone else which gave us the advantage of being able to produce more honey."

He said Texas has been carrying a lot of the weight because the nation as a whole has not been able to meet the demand for imported honey.

Burleson also said exported honey from large, honey-producing countries, such as Argentina and China, has been reduced. Reasons for this include, economics problems in Argentina and duties applied to both Argentina and China on honey shipped to the United States that may contain antibiotics.

Honey's price for the Texas beekeeper has been extremely good, but as is the case for many other products, Burleson said the prices are currently "easing-up" and becoming more reasonable.

He speculates retailers and packers have stocked-up quite a bit of honey by now and the need is not as great as it was earlier this year.