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Enhancing transparency and trust in the organic honey value chain - Pilot workshops series

17 October, 2025
A screenshot from the French workshop. A slide on data is shared on the main screen. The participant counter shows 49 attendees, and there is one chat message.

The ALLIANCE honey pilot, led by the Centre International de Hautes Etudes Agronomiques Mediterraneennes - Montpellier (CIHEAMM) in close collaboration with the World Bee Project, organised two workshops to present the traceability system, collect expert feedback, and explore possibilities for replicating the approach to other organic agri-food chains.

The first workshop took place on 31 July 2025, and reached a group of 24 key stakeholders based in the Occitanie region of France, in particular beekeepers and apiculture organisations, value chain actors (transformation and commercialisation of honey, local market), as well as researchers and extension workers. 

The session started with a presentation of the ALLIANCE project, followed by a deep dive on the main features of the system designed to enhance transparency in the organic honey value chain: hive-scale data collection, anomaly detection, and H-NMR
analysis. A core element was the integration of the different features, and their potential to enhance transparency and consumer trust. Participants were then introduced to the structure and economic relevance of the organic honey value chain in Occitanie. The last part of the session was dedicated to an open discussion on opportunities for replicating the approach in other organic agri-food sectors.

On 4 September, the same workshop was repeated, this time in English, and involving a small group of UK-based experts and valorisation board members. In this case, the smaller size of the audience allowed for a more in-depth Q&A session.  

In both cases, a dedicated evaluation questionnaire was shared to collect individual feedback on the proposed system, its usability, and its potential for wider application. 

Overall, feedback from participants validates the usefulness of the proposed system in improving traceability of organic honey, helping detect fraud instances, and increasing consumer loyalty. Additionally, the discussions confirmed the broader potential of digital traceability to strengthen sustainability and credibility across value chains.