NOT long before Christmas, Beechworth Honey vanished from the shelves of China's high-end supermarkets.
The famous Australian brand, which hails from a hamlet just south of the NSW-Victorian border, has been acclaimed as a shining example of the premium products that will help deliver new riches to Australia from China's rapidly expanding middle class, as it demands higher quality food.
The disappearance of Beechworth Honey had nothing to with quality of the product. Like many Australian brands – from Jurlique skincare products through to Tim Tam biscuits – Chinese consumers can't get enough of it. The problems is quantity – drought and bushfires in south-eastern Australia have wiped out up to 30 per cent of the bee population.
Such was the intensity of last summer's heatwave, some commercial hives actually melted. As a result, production from Australia's biggest honey processors has fallen 50 per cent.
Australia's only publicly listed honey producer, Capilano (ASX code CZZ), is also under pressure. Managing director Ben McKee said the past season had been the "worst year on record", with dry weather at key flowering times. "That has dramatically influenced the health of bees and their ability to produce honey," he said.
Dr McKee said Capilano's production would fall by at least 50 per cent, with the company importing honey from its plant in Argentina, as well as Canada and Europe, as well as China for some orders, so it can continue to supply its international customers, which account for about 25 per cent of its business.
Domestically, Capilano has removed some of its larger packs of honey from supermarket shelves and consolidated its range to continue to supply Australian honey.
A particularly tough year
As with all agricultural industries, honey producers are used to seasonal variations, but this year has been particularly bad. As a result, it's not just honey producers that are under pressure.
Insects are responsible for pollinating an estimated 76 per cent of the world's main crop species, with the honey bee by far the most efficient worker.
According to Beechworth Honey's owner and director, Jodie Goldsworthy, without bees the food bowl would shrink to "some grains, fish and grapes, that's about it".
"Even our proteins, meats – any of our grazing animals graze predominantly on European-derived pasture grasses like clovers and lucerne, which are highly dependent on honey bee pollination," she said.
The decline in bee numbers has come at a time when the third Parliamentary inquiry in the past six years has been launched about Australia's beekeeping and pollination.
Much of its attention is focused on the ever-present threat of the bloodsucking varroa mite entering Australia.
Australia's Food and Grocery Council warned in its submission to the inquiry that the food manufacturing sector could face a partial collapse if the parasite crossed our shores. The varroa mite, which originated in Japan and Korea in the 1950s, has infected every country except Australia.
Mat Lumalasi and Vanessa Kwiatkowski, owners of the social enterprise Rooftop Honey, gave up their IT jobs four years ago to turn their backyard hobby into a business and raise awareness about bees. They now operate 73 hives in Melbourne's city and inner fringe.
As well as raising awareness levels, the pair are working with the Victoria Department of Environment and Primary Industries to try and detect the varroa mite.
But Beechworth Honey's Jodie Goldsworthy says the federal government has so far tipped in $60,000, with beekeepers and other pollination dependent industries spending $75,000 each to protect the country against the mite.
A spokesman for Agriculture Minister Barnaby Joyce said the honey bee industry will benefit from $600 million allocated for Australia's biosecurity services this financial year.