On August 3, four large US beekeeping businesses have sued the US Department of Agriculture (USDA), alleging the agency’s organic honey rules favor foreign suppliers and mislead consumers, according to court document filed in US federal court in Eastern district of Washington.
The plaintiffs argue that US producers are effectively barred from large-scale organic honey production, while foreign suppliers can access USDA organic labeling through certification pathways tied to Canadian organic honey rules.
The plaintiffs allege that US honey producers are held to different standards than that of foreign producers who can still access the USDA organic seal through a Canadian certification route under the US-Canada Organic Equivalency Arrangement. This is the basis of the plaintiffs’ legal argument and has not yet been ruled upon.
So, if this is true, US beekeepers cannot realistically produce large volumes of organic honey because bees forage too widely, and US organic rules require forage areas to be free of synthetic fertilizers or pesticide chemicals. By contrast, the suit alleges foreign producers, especially in Brazil, can qualify for USDA organic labeling through Canadian rules that are more flexible on where hives may be placed. Specific to Brazil, the USDA standards assume that those foreign honey producers have access to larger swathes of organic land.
So, organic-compliant land as well as the threshold for pesticide residue are the issues facing domestic beekeepers, according to a new study led by researchers at Penn State, Cornell University, and Auburn University.
“As a result of the challenges of finding enough land to satisfy this requirement, US beekeepers have effectively been excluded from producing certified organic honey,” said the study’s co-author Margarita López-Uribe. “We wanted to know whether we could produce honey that was comparable to USDA certified organic honeys even without meeting the land requirements.”
So, if the USDA organic requirement for honey were edited, domestic producers may be able to compete with imported organic honey from Brazil or Vietnam, for example.
“Consumers are willing to pay 20 to 30% more for organic certified honey than nonorganic certified honey,” said Scott McArt, associate professor of entomology in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences and a senior author of the new study, published July 29 in the journal Science of the Total Environment. “If organic honey was possible to produce in the continental US, it would open up a huge market for our country’s beekeepers, who are really struggling right now.”
Brazilian Honey Exempt from US Section 301 Tariffs
So, it seems the recent lawsuit is more about the standards used to grade US-made honey, rather than disputing the quality of foreign honey. A timeline for the court’s decision was not available as of publication, with the lawsuit only recently filed in federal court.
It also seems that US government officials assume that Brazil has uniquely abundant organic land for bee forage. On the other hand, the plaintiffs argue that imported volumes appear inconsistent with the USDA’s organic expectations for hive placement and forage access.
The plaintiffs claim more lenient import pathways have helped drive a sharp rise in imported organic honey, particularly from Brazil, and displaced domestic honey from retail shelves.
Previously, on July 15, the US Trade Representative (USTR) team gave an exemption to imported organic honey from Brazil, while imposing US 25% tariffs on sugar imports, for example.
“Commenters assert that there is almost no domestic production of organic honey despite demand, noting that US production satisfies only 3% of annual domestic demand, while as much as 80% of US imports of organic honey is sourced from Brazil,” read the USTR document. “Commenters further explain that domestic production of organic honey cannot easily be increased given requirements for large quantities of pesticide-free land and native vegetation that does not exist in the United States, as well as the unique natural disease-resistance of Brazilian bee varieties. Commenters suggest that organic honey is a non-substitutable input for many downstream, processed products.”
So, some US honey buyers and packers are arguing that imports are essential to meet demand. For example, leaders from Minnesota’s Sweet Harvest Foods lobbied for honey’s exclusion from proposed US Section 301 tariffs on Vietnam, reported Expana.
Even still, domestic beekeepers (Royal Honey Farm; Strehlow Bees; Adee Honey Farms; and Fischer Honey Farm were named as plaintiffs) argue the current organic grading system disadvantages them.
For example, US beekeeper honey sales fell to about 116 million pounds in 2025, down 14% from the prior year, while organic honey imports climbed above 78 million pounds, according to the suit document.
“According to best estimates, as of May 2026, beekeeper warehouses held about 60 million pounds of unsold honey. Some beekeepers are now sitting on 3 years’ worth of unsold honey. Among those who were able to sell honey in the spring of 2026, most were forced to sell at net losses,” read the suit.
Written by Ryan Gallagher
