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to main content   Honey laundering: The sour side of nature's
golden sweetener Add to ...  As crime sagas go, a scheme rigged
by a sophisticated cartel of global traders has all the right
blockbuster elements: clandestine movements of illegal
substances through a network of co-operatives in Asia, a German
conglomerate, jet-setting executives, doctored laboratory
reports, high-profile takedowns and fearful turncoats.  What
makes this worldwide drama unusual, other than being regarded as
part of the largest food fraud in U.S. history, is the fact that
honey, nature's benign golden sweetener, is the lucrative
contraband.  Honey has become a staple in the North American
diet. Those that do not consume it straight from bear-shaped
squeeze bottles eat it regularly whether they know it or not -
honey is baked into everything from breakfast cereals to cookies
and mixed into sauces and cough drops. Produced by bees from the
nectar of flowers and then strai