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BETTER FRUIT 



The Honey Situation 



J illy, 1921 



By E. H. Tucker, Economic Statistician, First National Bank of Los Angeles and Los Angeles Trust & Savings Bank 



IT IS ONLY recently that the 

 honey industry has become a 

 specialized important industry in 

 the United States. This develop- 

 ment has taken place almost en- 

 tirely in the State of California and 

 is to a great extent the result of 

 the activity of co-operative mar- 

 keting associations. 



Heretofore, statistics as to honey pro- 

 duction and consumption in the United 

 States have been almost negligible, be- 

 cause of the fact that the production of 

 honey was maintained as a side-line by the 

 average agriculturist. The development of 

 the honey industry upon a scientific com- 

 mercial basis has created the necessity for 

 accurate information as to honey produc- 

 tion and for a careful scientific analysis of 

 the honey situation. 



California produces approximately 1 5 

 per cent of the honey produced in the 

 United States of America. Iowa is the sec- 

 ond state, producing 6 per cent of the en- 

 tire crop of the United States. New York, 

 Illinois, Michigan and Wisconsin each pro- 

 duce approximately 4 per cent, and Penn- 

 sylvania, Georgia, Florida, Ohio, Indiana, 

 Missouri and Colorado 3 per cent. No 

 other state produces more than 2 per cent 

 of the entire honey supply of the United 

 States. 



California alone markets the major pro- 

 portion of its honey production outside of 

 the state in which it is produced. As a gen- 

 eral rule from 70 per cent to 90 per cent 

 of the commercial honey produced in Cali- 

 fornia is marketed outside of the state and 

 from one-third to one-half of the honey 

 marketed outside of the state in which 

 produced is California honey. 



Careful estimates as to commercial honey 

 production in California during the past 

 20 years are given below: 



Year Pounds 



1900 2,208,000 



1901 8,112,000 



1902 5,125,000 



1903 . 8,400,000 



1904 1,040,000 



1905 10,000,000 



1906 -- 4,510,000 



1907 7,120,000 



1908 4,5 24,000 



1909 11,532,000 



1910 4,080,000 



1911 9,500,000 



1912 4,710,000 



1913 3,720,000 



1914 7,950,000 



1915 9,360,000 



1916 __ 8,100,000 



1917 6,500,000 



1918 ._ - -- 5,500,000 



1919 6,3 50,000 



1920 (not final).... 9,500,000 



It is impossible to secure accurate figures 

 as to total honey produced in the United 

 States of America. However, the chief of 

 the field service of the Department of 

 Agriculture estimates that 130,000,000 

 pounds will approximate the total honey 

 production in the United States during 

 1916, and states that it is his belief that 

 these figures are within 10 per cent of the 

 actual production. Upon this basis it is 



three forms in which honey enters the com- 

 mercial market. Next in importance to ex- 

 tracted honey is comb honey and there is a 

 small amount of chunk honey sold upon the 

 market. By chunk honey is meant that 

 honey which is sold in the form in which 

 it is taken from the hive, wax and honey 

 being intermingled. 



Practically all of the honey now pro- 

 duced in California is extracted honey. In 

 1916, 81 per cent of the California com- 

 mercial production was sold in such form. 

 In 1917, 82 per cent; in 1918, 90 per 

 cent; in 1919, 97 per cent, and in 1920, 





estimated that the total production for the 

 United States was about 150,000,000 

 pounds in 1917, 180,000,000 pounds in 

 1918, 210,000,000 pounds in 1919 and 

 250,000,000 pounds in 1920. It may be, 

 however that the 1920 production of honey 

 in the United States totaled as much as 

 300,000,000 pounds. This is the estimate 

 made by Dr. E. F. Phillip, epiculturist of 

 the Bureau of Entomology. 



COMMERCIAL honey is produced al- 

 most exclusively in the form of ex- 

 tracted, or bulk honey, although there are 



96 per cent. In the United States approxi- 

 mately 5 5 per cent to 60 per cent of all 

 honey produced is sold as extracted honey. 

 Comb honey is relatively unimportant in 

 California, production of such honey in 

 1920 amounting to only 2 per cent of the 

 total amount of honey produced in the state. 

 This is the result of the gradual change to 

 extracted honey, as in 1916 approximately 

 18 per cent of California honey was sold as 

 comb honey. 



The production of comb honey is ex- 

 ceptionally difficult and its lasting qualities 

 are such that it is hard to market comb 



