Busy bees in ‘23

You’re not likely to hear the buzz of a bee in Canada at this time of year, but a spoonful of their honey in a glass of hot tea sure does soothe a dry or sore throat on a cold winter night. Last summer, Canada’s “working” bees made the equivalent of 73 spoonsful of sweet soothing honey for every Canadian.

Backgrounder on bees

There are over 800 different native species of “wild” bees found across Canada. We don’t track those. We do, however, keep close tabs on Canada’s “working” bees, who play an essential role in pollinating crops and making honey.

Both types of working bees are included in our colony counts.

We counted 794,341 busy bee colonies in 2023, up 3.6% from a year earlier but 4.8% below the record high in 2021.

The Prairie bee honey makers

Canada’s working bees made 91.8 million pounds of honey in 2023, up 23.4% from a year earlier and the most honey produced since the record high of 106.6 million pounds in 2006.

Most of Canada’s honey was made by Prairie bees.

Alberta’s 302,900 colonies made 36,954 million pounds of honey in 2023, accounting for two-fifths (40.0%) of national production, followed by Saskatchewan (21.8%) and Manitoba (18.8%).

Fruit and vegetable pollinators in the temperate zones of Canada

Over one-third of bee colonies and one-fifth of honey production nationally in 2023 were outside of the Prairies.

While they may not make as much honey as their Prairie cousins, working bees in the remaining seven provinces are by no means less busy or important.

Indeed, from a strictly monetary perspective, pollinating bees are far more valuable, contributing billions of dollars annually to Canada’s farm economy.

Bees are essential for pollinating many fruits and vegetables grown in Canada, including apples in Nova Scotia, blueberries in Quebec, veggies in Ontario and cherries in British Columbia.

Where are you going, honey?

Most of the honey produced in Canada is exported abroad, with the United States and Japan being our most important honey export markets in 2022.

In October 2023 alone, Canada exported $4.2 million of domestically produced honey, with most headed for the United States and Japan. Much of the honey exported in October came from Manitoba and Alberta bees.

Beekeeper boom amid record high honey sales

We counted 15,147 beekeepers in the summer of 2023, 793 more than a year earlier and the highest number of beekeepers since 1988. There were over twice as many beekeepers in 2023 as there were throughout the late 2000s, when the number of beekeepers hit a record low of 6,831 in 2008.

British Columbia (+311) saw the largest increase in beekeepers in 2023, followed by Ontario (+199) and Alberta (+133).

Honey-producing beekeepers received a record high $277.2 million for their bees’ bounty in 2023, up 8.2% from a year earlier.