Canada is the sixth largest producer of honey in the world behind China, the United States, Mexico, Turkey and Argentina. Beekeeping is the oldest form of agriculture. For thousands of years, honey was the primary sweetener throughout the world. The first records of hives can be seen in Egyptian tombs. European settlers brought domestic bee hives from Europe to Canada.
Bees play a vital role in the pollination of fruits and vegetables.
Many fruits and vegetables require insects to move pollen from plant to plant. Fruit and vegetable producers rent beehives from beekeepers in the spring to make sure this pollination takes place. It takes more than 500 worker bees a full season to produce one pound of honey. For that pound, they will have visited about two million flowers and flown more than 55,000 miles. Individual honeybees make 25 trips a day, visiting more than 1,000 flowers.