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Mission Statement

'In partnership with customers and suppliers, Midlands takes pride in providing quality products and services derived from the arable industry'

Contact Us

Midlands Holdings Limited
393-405 West Street
P.O. Box 65
Ashburton
New Zealand

Phone: (03) 308 1265
Fax: (03) 308 1266

Contact us online

Our Values

  • Innovation

    We are committed to lead in the industry sectors we are involved in.


  • Integrity and Quality

    We maintain and respect maximum integrity, ethics and quality for our stakeholders, individuals and the environment.


  • Our people

    We value our people as individuals and encourage them to challenge themselves to perform to their capacity for mutual success.


  • Customers

    We respect and care for our customers, working in partnership to satisfy their needs and to give them the best possible value & outcomes.


  • Suppliers

    We see our suppliers, especially our farmer suppliers, as being in partnership with us. Their success is our success.


Midlands Apiaries Limited

Apiaries
7

Midlands Apiaries is based at Staveley, a small village at the foot of Mt. Somers, (10 minutes south of Mt. Hutt) on the Eastern flank of the Southern Alps, overlooking the Canterbury Plains of the South Island of New Zealand.

Our 2,700 hives of bees are divided between the foothills area where Honey Dew is gathered, and the fertile plains where the main crop is Clover Honey. A small number of hives are also moved to pollinate blackcurrant and other specialist crops.

New Zealand legislation prohibits the use of any chemicals on crops during the flowering period when the bees are gathering nectar, and throughout our entire flowering operation no chemicals or drugs are used. The bees are not fed on sugar, and using one of the world's most up-to-date honey extraction plants, we are able to extract the honey without applying heat to it. All this, and New Zealand's fresh, pollution free countryside means that our honey is truly PURE AND NATURAL.

There are two varieties of honey that Midlands Apiaries produce. These are Clover Honey and Honey Dew.

Honey Dew

Honey Dew is a forest honey, dark in colour, with a strong, full flavour which will not crystalise. It is produced by the honey bees collecting the sugary surplus produced by the soft scale insect which inhabits the species of native beech forest which clothes the lower slopes of the mountains in this area. The name Honey Dew reflects the appearance of the nectars silvery droplets covering the trees like morning dew. Because it is gathering in an uncultivated and remote area our Honey Dew is considered to be an ‘organically pure' product.

Clover Honey

Clover Honey is gathered form the lush pastures of the plains, from the mountains to the sea, and between the Rakaia and Rangitata Rivers. A light coloured and delicately flavoured honey, predominantly gathered from clover flowers it will also have traces of other meadow flower nectars. As with the majority of honeys, Clover will crystalise over a period of time unless it is heated which is detrimental to some of the health giving properties of honey. For this reason it is most popular in New Zealand when it has been creamed; a process of cooling and stirring which breaks down the size of the crystals; giving a creamy texture, ideal for spreading.

 


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