Deputy chair of the ACCC, Peter Kell, said: “Consumers expect products to match the description on the label. In this case, consumers expected premium honey sourced from Kangaroo Island.”
The ‘Just Organic’ honey label affixed to the product between early January 2008 and mid-2010 claimed it was ‘produced’ or ‘made with honey produced’ on Kangaroo Island in South Australia. Apparently, it’s well-known that Kangaroo Island has the only remaining pure population of the Ligurian honeybee in the world.
Different batches of the product produced during this period actually contained from 0.84-50.07% of Kangaroo Island honey, with the exception of one batch that did contain 100% honey from Kangaroo Island.
The product was manufactured by Spring Gully Foods and supplied for sale exclusively through Aldi Stores. Spring Gully was involved in developing the content of the label and Aldi approved the label.
Aldi Foods and Spring Gully accepted that the labels would be likely to have misled consumers about the composition of the product in contravention of the Trade Practices Act 1974.
Aldi Foods and Spring Gully Foods will inform consumers by corrective notices (on their websites, by Aldi in its stores and by Spring Gully Foods in newspapers), and establish and implement a compliance programme.
The undertakings will be available on the public register on the ACCC website.
Source: ACCC
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