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Danish honey among world’s best

Christian Wenande
September 18th, 2015


This article is more than 9 years old.

There was silverware galore at the Apimondia beekeeping world congress

Two Danish beekeepers, Lars Fischer and Zofuz Knudsen, showed that Denmark can produce world-class honey at the 2015 Apimondia beekeeping world congress held in Daejeon, South Korea.

Competing against entries from 114 other nations, the pair won first prize at the congress for their hard honey and second place for their liquid honey.

The pair aren’t strangers to winning prizes – last year they won the best honey title at the International Food Contest in Herning.

“Danish beekeepers make really good honey and have a tradition for doing so using gentle methods,” said Rune Havgaard Sørensen, the secretariat head of the national beekeeper association Danmarks Biavlerforening.

“When the bees gain access to areas that have a rich flowering through the whole season, we can produce some of the best honey in the world here in Denmark.”

READ MORE: Danish bees struggling to survive

Innovative prize
The honeys were judged by an international panel for their taste, appearance and texture and also underwent considerable laboratory analysis ahead of the competition to ascertain their purity.

Fischer and Knudsen weren’t the only Danes to walk away with some silverware.

The south-Jutland company Swienty, which sells beekeeping materials, won third place in the competition for innovation.

They won the prize for a new apparatus that measures Varroa destructor mites – the parasite with the most pronounced economic impact on the beekeeping industry – and makes it easier for beekeepers to reduce the number of attacks.

 


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Moreover, 21 percent of those surveyed admitted to medicating their kids with paracetamol, such as Panodil, before sending them to school.

The FOLA parents’ organisation is shocked by the findings.

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At Børnehuset there are fears that parents prefer to pack their kids off with a pill without informing teachers.

“We occasionally have children who that they have had a pill for breakfast,” said headteacher Susanne Bødker. “You might think that it is a Panodil more than a vitamin pill, if it is a child who has just been sick, for example.”

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Parents, when confronted, often cite pressure at work as a reason for not being able to stay at home with their children.

Many declare that they simply cannot take another day off, as they are afraid of being fired.

Allan Randrup Thomsen, a professor of virology at KU, has heavily criticised the parents’ actions, describing the current situation as a “vicious circle”.

“It promotes the spread of viruses, and it adds momentum to a cycle where parents are pressured by high levels of sick-leave. If they then choose to send the children to daycare while they are still recovering, they keep the epidemic going in daycares, and this in turn puts a greater burden on the parents.”