FSSAI CEO, at the AGM of India Honey Alliance, emphasized FSSAI’s commitment to supporting the honey industry, including resolving issues like HMF and harmonizing labs, and interpreting the regulations and standards.
Celebrating its successful journey over the last three years, (IHA) recently held its third AGM, September 03, 2024 in New Delhi. The event featured nearly 100 attendees, including beekeepers, IHA members, FPOs, Aggregators, Brand Retailers, the Scientific Community, and other industry stakeholders.
Kamala Vardhana Rao, CEO, FSSAI, graced the event as the Guest of Honor. He was accompanied by Dr. Satyen Kumar Panda, Advisor, Quality Assurance, FSSAI.
The dignitaries highlighted how IHA has emerged as the unified voice of all stakeholders in the honey marketplace within a few years of its inception and how the IHA has been working progressively for holistic development and creating a more enabling environment for the beekeeping sector. It is worth noting that the Government has recognized IHA as one of the key stakeholders in all honey-related matters.
In his keynote address, Kamala Vardhana Rao, CEO of FSSAI, highlighted FSSAI’s commitment to supporting the Honey ecosystem through resolving ongoing issues like HMF, harmonizing labs, and interpreting the regulations & standards for honey parameters. He supported the IHA efforts and agreed that technical training programs, consumer awareness & looking at the standards for honey were key elements.
He congratulated IHA on being one of the topmost organizations trying to understand the industry’s challenges, generating consumer awareness, and working towards improving productivity levels every year. Rao urged all the stakeholders to work towards creating demand for honey and promoting higher consumption of honey.
The AGM commenced with a traditional lamp lighting ceremony and a welcome address from Deepak Jolly, Secretary General of IHA. Namrata Khanna, Director of IHA, welcomed the guests and provided an overview of IHA’s extensive reach, initiatives, and achievements over the past years, including the prestigious MoU signed with NIFTEM-K.
Dr Komal Chauhan, Dean Outreach & HoD, NIFTEM-K, appreciated IHA’s efforts and said that the collaboration with IHA has proven to be extremely fruitful and value-driven. Ms Chauhan also highlighted that NIFTEM is coming up with a master trainers program for beekeeping and honey testing.
Rahul Awasthi, Chairperson of India Honey Alliance, also shared IHA’s vision for growth for all value chain members. He said, “Our motto at IHA is to uplift the beekeepers and work towards improving the state of the entire honey ecosystem. We have received great affirmations from the industry stakeholders, further inspiring us to take IHA to the next level.”
FSSAI CEO also mentioned they will call for a stakeholder consultation for honey on all aspects across the honey value chain and ecosystem. During the event, IHA and its notable members requested FSSAI to introduce consumer awareness programs and IHA across the country to bust the myths around honey.
Other distinguished government officers included Dr. RS Rajpoot, Small Farmers Agri-Consortium, Ministry of Agriculture & Farmers Welfare, GOI, and Dr Komal Chauhan, Dean Outreach, NIFTEM-K. Honey industry stalwarts included top brands, exporters as well as the top bee-keepers of India, Rahul Awasthi, Chairperson, IHA; Mansoor Ali, CSMO, Hamdard Foods; Pranav Sharma, Baidyanath; Ranjan Mitra, R&D Head, Dabur; Vinit Singh, Brij Honey Pvt Ltd; Amit Gupta, Indocan Honey Pvt Ltd; Narinder Jaryal, BDM, Thermo Fisher Scientific; Naveen Garg, MM Kashmiri Honey; Subhash Kamboj, Kamboj Honey Bee Farm; Vinod Kumar, One Circle Foundation. Deepak Jolly, Secretary General, IHA, and Namrata Khanna, Director, IHA, presided over the meeting.
At the event, experts collectively agreed that beekeeping is a very fragmented and unorganized sector and that the Government and the entire Honey ecosystem should collaborate to take strong measures to flourish the beekeeping sector, increase the export and production of honey, create sustainable income and employment for the beekeepers.
The dignitaries further mentioned that the honey industry has to come together and collaborate to grow and improve the ecosystem of sourcing, processing, testing, and packaging of honey for both domestic and global markets.
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