Fundamentals of Brazilian Honey Analysis: An Overview

Brazilian honey possesses large floral sources with various colors and flavors due to botanical and geographical differences and the large extension of the country. The absence of antibiotics and pesticides contamination positively differentiates Brazilian honey in the international market. Thus, the present chapter presents an overview of regulatory aspects for identity and quality evaluation of honey produced and commercialized in Brazil and international markets, as well as, it compares the production and consumption of honey with other countries. In addition, the chapter presents physicochemical and microbiological analysis commonly used in honey, as fundamentals of the technics and literature results with different kinds of honey obtained in Brazil. Physicochemical quality control and microbiological analysis of honey samples is of fundamental importance for assessing their quality, possible adulteration and storage conditions. In the literature, several methodologies exist to be used in the performance of honey quality control and each one complements the results in order to have an idea about the quality of the product, the absence of adulteration, deterioration, and environmental pollution and geographical area. Finally, we will present the market scenario nowadays with future perspectives and some recognition obtained for Brazilian bee products in international events