Pesticide Residues in Honey: What the Monitoring Data Actually Shows [2026]
An iComplai database analysis of 1,272 honey-related authority notifications — aggregated from the EU RASFF system and FDA import refusals — spanning 2010 to 16 June 2026. Here are the 125 substances flagged, the countries driving enforcement actions, and what the 2026 regulatory changes mean for your supply chain.
Honey is a supply chain paradox. It is one of the most regulated food products in global trade, yet one of the most consistently flagged for contamination. Pesticide residues in honey arrive by a route no other commodity shares: bees forage over several kilometres, so a hive integrates whatever was sprayed across that radius. Add veterinary drug carry-over from apiculture practice and deliberate adulteration for profit, and honey becomes a multi-layered compliance challenge that no single analytical method can fully address.
To quantify that challenge, iComplai compiled and analysed 1,272 honey-related safety notifications in its database — enforcement data from the EU Rapid Alert System for Food and Feed (RASFF) and U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) import refusals — covering the period from 2010 through 16 June 2026. The analysis identified 125 distinct substances flagged across those notifications, and it shows that what drives honey enforcement in 2026 is not pesticide residues at all, but colour additives, substitution and pharmaceutical adulteration.
This article presents those findings alongside EFSA monitoring data, published research on neonicotinoid contamination, and the regulatory changes taking effect in 2026 — giving food safety professionals a data-driven view of where the risks actually are.
Data source: 1,272 notification records extracted from the iComplai Detailed View module, covering honey-related alerts from FDA import refusals and RASFF notifications. Substance trends verified via the iComplai Substances by Year module, which tracks the first and most recent detection date of every substance in the honey record. All data current through 16 June 2026.
Why Is Honey Flagged More Often Than Other Commodities?
Honey is flagged more often because it is a passive sampler of its landscape. Bees forage over several kilometres, so a hive integrates whatever was sprayed across that radius rather than what was applied to one field, and origin declarations therefore describe where the hive stood, not where the residues came from. iComplai’s authority-notification database — 1,272 honey records drawn from RASFF and FDA import refusals between 2010 and 16 June 2026 — carries 125 distinct substances, which is the practical reason a single-substance test plan under-detects: the residue screened for is rarely the only one present. The second pattern is that process-control and programme failures such as FSVP deficiencies surface episodically rather than steadily, so a clean certificate of analysis does not by itself predict whether a consignment will be actioned.
How Widespread Are Pesticide Residues in Honey?
Pesticide contamination in honey is a global phenomenon. A landmark worldwide survey published in Science found that 75% of all honey samples collected from every continent contained at least one neonicotinoid insecticide, 45% contained two or more, and 10% contained four or five [1]. North America had the highest detection frequency at 86%, followed by Asia and Europe, while South America had the lowest at 57%.
In the EU specifically, the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) analysed 1,743 honey samples in its 2023 monitoring programme. That report is no longer the newest: EFSA’s 2024 report (EFSA Journal 24(5), e10054) covers 1,540 honey samples and shows the picture worsening, not improving [17]. The 2023 results were [2]:
- 88.2% of samples had no quantifiable pesticide residues
- 10.1% had residues within legal Maximum Residue Levels (MRLs)
- 1.7% exceeded MRLs (30 samples)
- 1.2% were classified as non-compliant (21 samples, after measurement uncertainty adjustment)
Both measures improved on 2022 in that dataset: MRL exceedances fell from 3.6% to 1.7%, and non-compliance from 2.2% to 1.2%. The 2024 report reverses part of it — samples with no quantifiable residues fell to 83.6%, and MRL exceedances rose to 2.1%, while the non-compliance rate improved again to 0.8% [17]. Twenty-three different pesticides were quantified across the 2023 honey samples, and the substances driving the problem are shifting.
iComplai finding: Our Substances by Year module records no pesticide-residue honey notification since 2022 — the 2026 honey record is dominated instead by unsafe colours, substitution and labelling. The pesticide residues ever recorded in the honey category are oxymatrine, matrine, acrinathrin, fluvalinate, tau-fluvalinate, allethrin and permethrin, alongside generic FDA “pesticide” import refusals.
Which Pesticides Are Most Commonly Found in Honey in 2026?
On the iComplai record, none. The honey category carries 125 distinct substances since 2010, but it holds no pesticide-residue notification for 2023, 2024, 2025 or 2026 — the last were two in 2022 and four in 2021. The pesticide residues ever recorded in honey notifications are oxymatrine, matrine, acrinathrin, fluvalinate, tau-fluvalinate, allethrin and permethrin, alongside generic FDA “pesticide” import refusals. What is driving honey enforcement in 2026 is a different picture entirely, and it is a food fraud and adulteration picture rather than a residue one.
| Hazard flagged in 2026 honey notifications | What it is | Where it is showing up |
|---|---|---|
| Unsafe / undeclared colour additives | Colours not permitted in honey, or present but not declared | India, Bangladesh (FDA) |
| Artificial colouring | Added colour in a product sold as honey | India (FDA) |
| Substitution | Honey replaced or extended with another substance | Armenia (FDA) |
| Nutritional information / misbranding | Incorrect or missing nutrition and labelling declarations | Bangladesh, Nigeria, Thailand, Albania (FDA) |
| Veterinary drug residues | Veterinary actives not authorised for use in honey bees | Pakistan (FDA) |
| Unsafe additive | Additive not authorised for honey | Pakistan (FDA) |
| Sildenafil and tadalafil | Erectile-dysfunction actives added to honey and honey pastes | Syria; a UK consignment notified by France (RASFF) |
| Semicarbazide | Marker metabolite for the veterinary drug nitrofurazone | RASFF honey notifications, 2026 |
Module verification: Every hazard above was identified through the iComplai Detailed View module, which aggregates RASFF notifications and FDA import refusals under a standardised substance taxonomy. The Canonical Substance field normalises naming variations across jurisdictions — for example, mapping FDA’s “carbendazim” and RASFF’s “benomyl group” to a single entry for consistent trend analysis.
What Do the RASFF Notification Patterns Tell Us?
A peer-reviewed analysis of EU RASFF notifications for honey from 2002 to 2022 — published in the Journal of Consumer Protection and Food Safety — found 388 total honey-related notifications across that 21-year period [3]. The breakdown by hazard category reveals a clear hierarchy:
| Hazard category | Share of notifications | Notifications |
|---|---|---|
| Veterinary drug residues | 79.64% | 309 |
| Adulteration / fraud | 5.15% | 20 |
| Foreign bodies | 2.83% | 11 |
| Pesticide residues | 2.58% | 10 |
| Poor / insufficient controls | 2.58% | 10 |
| Other categories | 7.22% | 28 |
The dominance of veterinary drug residues — led by chloramphenicol at 25.26% of all notifications — reflects decades of antibiotic misuse in apiculture, particularly in Asia. The category breakdown has shifted since the study period, though, and not in the direction most residue programmes assume: in the iComplai multi-authority record, pesticide residues have all but disappeared from honey notifications since 2022, while colour additives, substitution fraud and pharmaceutical adulteration now drive enforcement. Pesticide-residue honey notifications peaked at 18 in 2011, ran at one to four a year through the 2010s, and have been zero every year since 2022.
China was the most frequently notified country of origin at 25.77%, followed by Turkey (6.44%), Ukraine (6.19%), Argentina (6.19%), and Bulgaria (5.67%) [3].
iComplai extends this further: Our regulatory intelligence and horizon scanning tracks notifications beyond the scope of the Springer study — through 16 June 2026, and across the US border record as well as the EU one. The 1,272 honey records in the iComplai Detailed View combine RASFF notifications with FDA import refusals, and that pairing surfaces hazard patterns a single-source analysis cannot see: the two authorities do not flag the same things.
Which Countries Are Driving Honey Safety Notifications?
Honey notifications in 2026 are driven chiefly by India, whose honey refusals that year all concern unsafe colour or artificial colouring. Across 1 January 2021 to 16 June 2026, India accounts for 91 honey-category enforcement actions — more than Mexico (34), China (24) and Türkiye (18) combined. iComplai’s authority-notification database (1,272 honey records from RASFF and FDA import refusals, 2010 to 16 June 2026) records these 2026 cases:
| Country of origin | Authority | Key hazard flagged | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| India | FDA | Unsafe or undeclared colour additives in honey products | FDA Import Refusals |
| Pakistan | FDA | Unsafe additive and veterinary drug residues | FDA Import Refusals |
| Bangladesh | FDA | Labelling and colour violations; FSVP importer verification failure (January 2026) | FDA Import Refusals |
| Thailand | FDA | Nutritional information / misbranding; FSVP importer verification failure (April 2026) | FDA Import Refusals |
| Albania | FDA | Nutritional information / misbranding | FDA Import Refusals |
| Nigeria | FDA | Nutritional information / misbranding | FDA Import Refusals |
| Armenia | FDA | Substance substitution — honey adulteration | FDA Import Refusals |
| Taiwan | FDA | Failure to file a scheduled process (21 CFR Part 108) | FDA Import Refusals |
| Syria | RASFF | Sildenafil and tadalafil in a honey herbal paste | RASFF 2026.4893 |
| United Kingdom | RASFF | Tadalafil detected in honey (notified by France) | RASFF 2026.5710 |
| Moldova | RASFF | Illegal import attempt, poor temperature control and absence of labelling on a mixed animal-origin consignment including honey — recorded under “Other food items / mixed”, not the honey category | RASFF 2026.3984 |
Mexico, Indonesia and Italy also appear among the 2026 FDA honey origins, and Malaysia and Ukraine among the RASFF ones. Read against the longer series, the ranking has moved: studies averaging 2002–2022 put China first, and the current record does not.
The Syrian honey case is particularly notable. RASFF notification 2026.4893 (3 June 2026) documented sildenafil and tadalafil in a honey herbal paste, with the two analytical results reported at 7,080 ± 1,420 mg/kg and 2,100 ± 420 mg/kg — pharmaceutical compounds at concentrations far beyond any therapeutic dose, and a serious consumer safety risk. The product was placed under official detention in Germany [4]. The United Kingdom entry above is the same hazard reaching a different market: RASFF 2026.5710, tadalafil in honey, notified by France.
Module verification: The country-of-origin analysis was run in the iComplai Detailed View module in two passes. The first filtered on Canonical Product Category = “Honey, royal jelly and sweeteners (nutritive)” for 1 January to 16 June 2026. The second was a targeted text search for honey inside mixed-product notifications, which is where the Moldova consignment sits; rows from that pass are labelled as mixed-category in the table. Each notification carries its original authority reference number, so every row can be re-checked against the RASFF Window or the FDA Import Refusals database.
What Are the EU Maximum Residue Levels for Pesticides in Honey?
The EU regulates pesticide residues in honey under Regulation (EC) No 396/2005. Unlike most food commodities where MRLs are set substance-by-substance based on Good Agricultural Practice (GAP) data, honey presents a unique challenge: bees forage over a 3–7 km radius, encountering multiple crops and treatments that the beekeeper cannot control.
Where no specific MRL has been set for a substance in honey, Regulation (EC) No 396/2005 applies a generic default of 0.01 mg/kg under Article 18(1)(b). That default is a legislated trading limit, not “the lowest level a laboratory can measure” — a distinction that matters whenever a laboratory reports a trace beneath its own reporting limit. In practice the default functions as a near-zero-tolerance standard: honey is expected to be free of a residue unless a higher MRL has been established for it.
What Changed for Honey MRLs in 2026?
Several regulatory actions are reshaping the MRL landscape for honey in 2026:
- Acetamiprid MRL raised from 0.3 to 1.0 mg/kg for honey and other apiculture products by Commission Regulation (EU) 2026/876 of 21 April 2026, applying from 12 May 2026, following EFSA evaluation of 10 GAP-compliant residue trials where concentrations ranged from 0.03 to 0.55 mg/kg. EFSA concluded the higher MRL poses no consumer health risk [5][18].
- Commission Regulation (EU) 2026/140 — adopted 22 January 2026, amends MRLs for six pesticide substances across multiple commodities including honey and apiculture products [6].
- Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2026/765 — of 1 April 2026, replacing Directive 2002/63/EC on the methods of sampling and analysis and the interpretation of results for official control of pesticide residues [7].
- Carbendazim MRLs cut to the limit of determination — Commission Regulation (EU) 2026/1546 of 8 July 2026 reduces carbendazim MRLs to 0.01–0.05 mg/kg depending on product, applying from 29 January 2027 [16]. It is the outcome of the European Parliament’s objection on 18 September 2024 to two Commission draft regulations that would have allowed higher residue levels for EU-banned pesticides in imports [8]. France went further with the Arrêté of 5 January 2026, in force from 8 January and applied since 8 February 2026, suspending the import and sale of listed foods containing residues of carbendazim, thiophanate-methyl, glufosinate or mancozeb [13].
Compliance implication: The acetamiprid step from 0.3 to 1.0 mg/kg may appear to lower the compliance bar, but it reflects real-world residue data from legitimate apiculture — bees foraging on treated crops will produce honey with detectable acetamiprid. The change does not reduce the risk; it acknowledges what was previously a de facto non-compliance trap for compliant producers. Read results generated before 12 May 2026 against the 0.3 mg/kg limit that was then in force, and later results against 1.0 mg/kg.
Module verification: All regulatory changes cited above are tracked in the iComplai Regulatory Intelligence module, which monitors the EU Official Journal, EFSA Journal, FDA Federal Register, and 50+ additional sources for MRL modifications, substance approvals, and enforcement directives affecting the food supply chain.
Honey is where residue data and adulteration data have to be read together
Pesticide findings and sugar-syrup adulteration show up in different systems, on different clocks. iComplai reads both streams against the same commodity and flags the pairs that are moving — so a sourcing decision uses this week’s evidence, not last year’s audit.
See how the model worksHow Do FDA Import Alerts Target Honey?
The U.S. FDA maintains two Import Alerts specifically relevant to honey:
- Import Alert 36-04 (updated March 5, 2026): “Detention Without Physical Examination of Honey and Blended Syrup Due to Unsafe Drug Residues.” This alert targets chloramphenicol, nitrofurans, and fluoroquinolones — antibiotics not approved for use in honey bees. Fluoroquinolones first appeared in Malaysian, Thai, and Chinese honey imports in 2009 and have since been detected in honey from India, Egypt, and Pakistan [9].
- Import Alert 99-05 (updated April 6, 2026): “Detention Without Physical Examination of Raw Agricultural Products for Pesticides.” A broader alert covering all agricultural commodities, including honey, that are subject to DWPE for illegal pesticide chemical residues [10].
Beyond these standing alerts, a persistent minority of FDA honey enforcement concerns process control rather than substance detection — 17% of FDA honey notifications in 2022, 25% in 2024, 5% in 2025 and 14% in 2026. The share is lumpy rather than rising, but it never goes to zero. Notifications citing 21 CFR Part 108 (Emergency Permit Control) and 21 CFR Part 113 (Thermally Processed Low-Acid Foods) mean some honey imports are rejected not for what they contain but for how they were manufactured — failure to register with FDA, failure to file a scheduled process, or no trained operator for a thermal processing system.
iComplai finding: Our Authority Notifications module recorded two FDA FSVP (Foreign Supplier Verification Program) importer violations for honey in 2026 — Bangladesh in January and Thailand in April. FSVP actions against honey importers appear episodically rather than on a trend: 3 in 2021, 9 in 2022, none in 2023, 11 in 2024, none in 2025 and 2 so far in 2026. Import Alert 99-41 flags U.S. importers who failed to verify that their foreign honey suppliers meet FDA food safety standards — shifting enforcement pressure from the exporting country to the domestic importer.
How Does Neonicotinoid Contamination Affect Honey Globally?
Neonicotinoids represent the most pervasive class of pesticide residues in honey worldwide. Unlike organophosphates or carbamates that degrade relatively quickly, neonicotinoids are systemic — they are absorbed by the plant and distributed throughout its tissues, including nectar and pollen, making them directly available to foraging bees.
The published per-compound detection rates come from a single paywalled dataset that could not be re-verified for this article, so what follows is the part that is checkable: the EU regulatory status of each.
| Neonicotinoid | EU status |
|---|---|
| Imidacloprid | Banned for outdoor use (2018) |
| Thiamethoxam | Banned for outdoor use (2018) |
| Clothianidin | Banned for outdoor use (2018) |
| Acetamiprid | Approved; honey MRL 1.0 mg/kg from 12 May 2026 |
| Thiacloprid | Approval not renewed (2020) |
The regional variation is striking: North America showed 86% detection of at least one neonicotinoid, compared to 57% in South America. In the EU, despite the 2018 outdoor ban on three neonicotinoids (imidacloprid, clothianidin, thiamethoxam), residues continue to appear in honey — reflecting environmental persistence, greenhouse use exemptions, and imports from countries where these substances remain in use.
Acetamiprid occupies a unique regulatory position: it is the only neonicotinoid still approved for outdoor use in the EU, and EFSA has twice recommended raising its honey MRL — to 0.3 mg/kg in its 2022 opinion, enacted by Commission Regulation (EU) 2025/1212 of 24 June 2025, and to 1.0 mg/kg, enacted by Commission Regulation (EU) 2026/876 and applying from 12 May 2026 [11]. The distinction matters when you are dating a limit: EFSA evaluates and recommends, and the Commission sets the legal MRL, often years later. The 85 quantified detections in EFSA’s 2023 monitoring programme make acetamiprid the single most frequently found pesticide in EU honey [2].
Why Are EU-Banned Pesticides Still Appearing in Honey?
EU-banned pesticides continue to be reported in imported food generally — carbendazim, thiophanate-methyl and atrazine among them. In honey specifically, the iComplai record shows no such detection since 2022. The structural reasons the gap exists have not gone away, though, and they are why honey stays on residue-monitoring plans even in a year with no residue notifications. There are three of them.
1. Import tolerance gaps
The EU sets MRLs for imported products, but many non-EU countries continue to use pesticides that Europe has banned. When honey from these countries enters the EU market, it may carry residues of substances that are legal at origin but illegal at destination. The European Parliament’s September 2024 rejection of proposals to relax import tolerances for carbendazim was a direct response to this gap [12].
2. Environmental persistence
Some pesticides persist in soil and water long after their use has been discontinued. Atrazine, banned in the EU since 2004, is still detected in groundwater across Europe. Bees foraging on crops grown in contaminated soil can accumulate residues that were never directly applied during the honey production season.
3. Metabolite detection
Thiophanate-methyl metabolizes to carbendazim in the environment and in food commodities. A positive carbendazim detection may therefore reflect either direct carbendazim application or the breakdown of thiophanate-methyl — making source attribution difficult without additional analytical context. France addressed this ambiguity by covering both substances in one measure: the Arrêté of 5 January 2026, in force from 8 January and applied since 8 February 2026 [13].
Module verification: The iComplai Substances by Year module tracks the first and most recent detection date for every substance in the honey notification database. That is what makes a negative finding checkable rather than merely absent: no pesticide-residue honey notification has been recorded since 2022. It also shows the honey record is dominated by the US border rather than by EU alerts — roughly 1,150 US import refusals in the honey category since 2010, against about 125 RASFF notifications over the same period.
What Detection Methods Are Used for Pesticide Residues in Honey?
Honey is a complex analytical matrix — its high sugar content, acidity, and natural enzyme activity create interference patterns that complicate residue extraction and quantification. The current standard methods include:
| Method | Target substances | LOQ range | Strengths |
|---|---|---|---|
| QuEChERS + LC-MS/MS | Multi-residue screening (200+ pesticides) | 0.001–0.01 mg/kg | Rapid, cost-effective, broad coverage |
| GC-MS/MS | Volatile and semi-volatile pesticides | 0.005–0.05 mg/kg | Complementary to LC for non-polar compounds |
| LC-Q-Orbitrap HRMS | Targeted + non-targeted screening | 0.001–0.01 mg/kg | Retrospective analysis, unknown compound detection |
| ELISA immunoassay | Single-substance rapid screening | 0.001–0.1 mg/kg | Field-deployable, fast turnaround |
| Cholinesterase inhibition | Organophosphates, carbamates | Semi-quantitative | Low cost, rapid class-level screening |
The EU rules for official control of pesticide residues were consolidated in Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2026/765, which replaces Directive 2002/63/EC and governs how samples are taken, how they are analysed, and how results are interpreted [7].
For food businesses, the practical implication is that a single test method is insufficient. A comprehensive pesticide monitoring program for honey should combine multi-residue screening (QuEChERS + LC-MS/MS) with targeted methods for known regional risks — for example, carbendazim-group fungicides for imports from countries where those substances are still in use, and, given what the 2026 record actually holds, colour additives and pharmaceutical actives. Residue screening is only half the panel; our guide to honey adulteration detection and testing methods covers the authenticity half.
How Should Importers Risk-Stratify Honey by Origin?
Mitigating pesticide risk in honey comes down to five controls: risk-stratifying by origin, testing beyond the standard panel, tracking MRL changes, verifying FSVP documentation, and continuous horizon scanning. The first two are the ones a buyer can act on this quarter, and both are driven by what the authority record actually shows rather than by reputation.
1. How do you risk-stratify honey by origin?
Not all honey origins carry equal risk. Score suppliers by country of origin against authority notification data rather than against category reputation. On the current record India warrants the most attention: 91 honey-category enforcement actions between 1 January 2021 and 16 June 2026, against Mexico 34, China 24 and Türkiye 18. The China-first ranking comes from studies averaging 2002–2022 and no longer matches what authorities are recording. Newer risk origins — Syria and the UK case notified by France (pharmaceutical adulteration), Armenia (substitution fraud), India (colour additives) — belong on watch lists on the strength of the 2026 data.
2. What should a honey test panel actually cover?
EFSA’s 23-pesticide panel covers the most common residues but misses emerging threats, and a residue panel alone misses the 2026 honey picture entirely. The honey category carries 125 distinct substances in total — 82 in the RASFF record and 46 in the US refusal record — a wider spread than any fixed screening panel covers. Request expanded multi-residue methods from your laboratory, and add colour-additive and pharmaceutical screening for the origins where those hazards are being recorded.
How Do You Keep Up With Honey MRL and FSVP Changes?
Keeping up means tracking three moving parts on three different clocks: MRL amendments in the EU Official Journal, national measures that go beyond them, and FDA importer-side enforcement. None of the three notifies you, and each can change what a laboratory result means without the result changing at all. The three controls below are what closes that gap.
3. How do you track MRL changes as they happen?
The acetamiprid MRL change from 0.3 to 1.0 mg/kg, applying from 12 May 2026, means honey previously flagged as non-compliant may now pass. Conversely, France’s Arrêté of 5 January 2026, applied since 8 February 2026, creates new non-compliance risk for supply chains routing through France. Manual tracking of these changes across 27 EU member states plus the UK and US is not sustainable.
4. How do US importers stay FSVP-ready?
FSVP actions against honey importers appear episodically in the iComplai data — 9 in 2022, 11 in 2024, 2 so far in 2026 — so treat FSVP documentation as a standing exposure rather than a one-off compliance cycle. Import Alert 99-41 specifically targets importers who cannot demonstrate that their foreign suppliers meet FDA requirements. Ensure your Foreign Supplier Verification Program documentation is current and audit-ready.
5. Why does continuous horizon scanning matter?
The gap between a substance first appearing in authority notifications and its inclusion in published EFSA monitoring reports can be 12–24 months — the 2024 EFSA report reaching readers in 2026 is the illustration. AI-powered monitoring platforms that aggregate notifications across multiple authorities as they are published provide the earliest available warning of emerging contamination patterns.
Key insight from the data: combining authorities changes the answer. In the RASFF record, veterinary drug residues dominate honey notifications; in the US import-refusal record, colour additives, misbranding and process-control failures carry most of the 2026 enforcement. Neither picture is wrong and neither is complete. Pesticide residues, meanwhile, have all but disappeared from honey notifications since 2022 — which is a finding about where to look next, not a reason to stop testing. A comprehensive monitoring strategy requires aggregated visibility across every authority that touches the commodity.
Module verification: The iComplai Risk Prediction module uses machine learning to identify commodities, origins and substances whose notification frequency is rising before they reach the threshold for regulatory action.
Frequently asked questions
Which pesticides are most commonly found in honey in 2026?
None, on the iComplai record. The honey category holds no pesticide-residue notification for 2023, 2024, 2025 or 2026; the last were two in 2022 and four in 2021. The pesticide residues ever recorded in honey notifications are oxymatrine, matrine, acrinathrin, fluvalinate, tau-fluvalinate, allethrin and permethrin.
What is the EU maximum residue level for pesticides in honey?
Where no specific MRL has been set for a substance in honey, Regulation (EC) No 396/2005 applies a generic default of 0.01 mg/kg under Article 18(1)(b). That default is a legislated trading limit rather than a laboratory detection floor, and in practice it works as a near-zero-tolerance standard for honey.
Did the EU raise the acetamiprid MRL in honey?
Yes. Commission Regulation (EU) 2026/876 of 21 April 2026 raised the acetamiprid MRL for honey and other apiculture products from 0.3 to 1.0 mg/kg, applying from 12 May 2026. EFSA had evaluated ten GAP-compliant residue trials with concentrations from 0.03 to 0.55 mg/kg and concluded the higher limit poses no consumer health risk.
Which countries are driving honey safety notifications in 2026?
India leads by a wide margin, with 91 honey-category enforcement actions between January 2021 and June 2026, against Mexico 34, China 24 and Türkiye 18. Every Indian honey refusal in 2026 concerns unsafe colour or artificial colouring. Syria, Armenia, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Thailand, Malaysia and Ukraine also appear in the 2026 record.
Why do EU-banned pesticides still turn up in imported food?
Three reasons. Import tolerance gaps, because substances banned in the EU stay legal at origin. Environmental persistence, because residues such as atrazine linger in soil and water long after use stops. And metabolite detection, because thiophanate-methyl breaks down to carbendazim, so a positive result does not tell you which substance was applied.
How should importers test honey for pesticide residues?
Combine multi-residue screening by QuEChERS with LC-MS/MS against targeted methods for known regional risks. A fixed panel under-detects: the honey category carries 125 distinct substances since 2010, 82 in the RASFF record and 46 in the US refusal record, so the residue screened for is rarely the only one present.
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Talk to iComplaiWhere these claims come from
- Mitchell, E.A.D., et al. (2017). A worldwide survey of neonicotinoids in honey. Science, 358(6359), 109–111. pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28983052
- EFSA (2025). The 2023 European Union report on pesticide residues in food. EFSA Journal, 23(5), e9398. pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC12076349
- Contaminants in honey: an analysis of EU RASFF notifications from 2002 to 2022. Journal of Consumer Protection and Food Safety (2023). link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00003-023-01460-x
- European Commission RASFF Notification 2026.4893 — Sildenafil and tadalafil in honey product from Syria. webgate.ec.europa.eu/rasff-window/screen/notification/848832
- EFSA (2025). Modification of the existing maximum residue level for acetamiprid in honey. EFSA Journal, 23(3), e9300. efsa.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.2903/j.efsa.2025.9300
- Commission Regulation (EU) 2026/140 amending Annexes II and III to Regulation (EC) No 396/2005. Official Journal of the European Union. eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/reg/2026/140/oj/eng
- Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2026/765. eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=OJ:L_202600765
- European Parliament (2024). Pesticides: no residues of EU-banned products in imported food. Press release, 17 September 2024. europarl.europa.eu/news/en/press-room/20240917IPR24036
- FDAImports.com (2026). Import Alert #36-04: Honey and Syrup With Fluoroquinolones. fdaimports.com/get-off-import-alert-36-04-honey
- FDA Import Alert 99-05: Detention of Raw Agricultural Products for Pesticides. accessdata.fda.gov/cms_ia/importalert_258.html
- EFSA (2025). Modification of the existing maximum residue levels for acetamiprid in various crops and honey. EFSA Journal, 23(7), e9774. efsa.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.2903/j.efsa.2025.9774
- IngredientsNetwork (2024). EU Parliament blocks Commission plans to allow banned pesticide presence in foods. ingredientsnetwork.com/eu-parliament-blocks-commission-plans-to-allow-news125698
- Arrêté du 5 janvier 2026 portant suspension d’importation, d’introduction et de mise sur le marché à titre gratuit ou onéreux, en France, de denrées alimentaires provenant de pays tiers à l’Union européenne contenant des résidus de certaines substances actives phytopharmaceutiques interdites d’utilisation dans l’Union européenne. JORF n°0005 du 7 janvier 2026. legifrance.gouv.fr/jorf/id/JORFTEXT000053313910
- PAN Europe (2024). EU Parliament’s Veto Ignored: Commission continues to allow residues of certain banned toxic pesticides in imported foods. pan-europe.info/blog/eu-parliaments-veto-ignored
- EFSA (2024). Modification of the existing maximum residue levels for picloram in animal commodities and honey. EFSA Journal, 22(10), e9067. efsa.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.2903/j.efsa.2024.9067
- Commission Regulation (EU) 2026/1546 of 8 July 2026 amending Annexes II, III and V to Regulation (EC) No 396/2005 as regards maximum residue levels for benomyl, carbendazim and thiophanate-methyl in or on certain products. Official Journal of the European Union. eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/reg/2026/1546/oj/eng
- EFSA (2026). The 2024 European Union report on pesticide residues in food. EFSA Journal, 24(5), e10054. efsa.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.2903/j.efsa.2026.10054
- Commission Regulation (EU) 2026/876 of 21 April 2026 amending Annex II to Regulation (EC) No 396/2005 as regards maximum residue levels for acetamiprid, aclonifen, deltamethrin, oxathiapiprolin and potassium phosphonates in or on certain products. Official Journal of the European Union. eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/reg/2026/876/oj/eng