There are 460,827 beehives and 9,190 beekeepers in Croatia, about 8,000 tonnes of honey is produced in a good year, yet last year honey imports jumped 41% to 2,430 tonnes, the 11th national conference on the safety and quality of bee products heard in Kastav on Friday.

Drazen Lusic of the Rijeka Faculty of Medicine said an informed consumer was the beekeepers’ biggest ally and that the Croatian market was very similar to Europe’s, although the domestic system was flawed and should better protect Croatian honey consumers.

Lusic said there was a shortage of reference information and not enough is known about the value of the domestic market of bee products. That should be worked on in order to better integrate with the EU market, he added.

According to Croatian Chamber of Commerce data, HRK 24.9 million worth of honey was imported into Croatia in 2020, jumping to HRK 42.2 million in 2021.

Last year, most of the honey was imported from Spain (748 tonnes), followed by Poland (680 t) and China (552 t) at HRK 14.39, 21.66 and 12.05 per kilo, with beekeepers wondering how that is possible.

Croatia also imports honey from Germany, Ukraine, and 14 other countries.

Speaking of the value of Croatia’s entire beekeeping sector, Lusic said it was estimated at HRK 1 billion annually.

(€1 = HRK 7.5)