European court ruled that GM contaminated honey must be labeled and needs EU food safety approval

German beekeepers sued the Bavarian government after their honey was contaminated by field trials of Monsanto’s GM maize Monsanto 810 in 2005. The GM maize is used as feed and is not allowed for the consumption by humans. Any GM contaminated honey must now be subject to full safety authorisation and labelling. [1]

Half of Canadian and South American honey imports must be removed from self of European stores
Half of imported honey from Canada and South America have been tested positive for GM contamination by Ökotest in 2009. Contaminated products must be taken out of the shelf of European food stores. This will have an effect on European GM ruling and is a severe setback for the GM agrarian lobby which is trying to water down the zero tollerance to GM contamination of food. Honey producers can now sue any maize GM grower when his honey is contaminated by Monsanto 810 polen or othes GM variety.

In 1998 Monsanto obtained authorisation to market certain MON810 maize products as maize flour, maize starch, and maize oil but not for MON810 food products in general. Honey is a special product because besides the different kinds of sugar produced by the bees it also contains pollen. Therefore it is in parallel an animal and plant product. The GM regulation 1829/2003 excludes animal products from obligatory GM labelling, if animals are fed with GM feed. [2]

[1] European court to rule on GM contamination in honey. Friends of the Earth Europe. 06.09.2011.
http://www.foeeurope.org/press/2011/Sep6_European_court_to_rule_GM_conta...

[2] GM regulation 1829/2003 on genetically modified food and feed
http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=OJ:L:2003:268:0001:0023:EN:PDF