Meadery Laws in Canada Rant

[Bugeaud]

Here in BC, the meadery laws are really stupid. They basically put mead under the same category of wine, which it is not. And you have to own your own apiary and harvest all of your own honey which you use in your mead (Were the lucky ones, in Ontario they have to have at least 100 bee hives to start a meadery!). This is somewhat understandable if the mead IS like wine, but what if it's a more beer/cider type mead with lower alcohol content? Shouldn't it then be under the same laws of beer and cider who can get all of there ingredients imported if they so like? Undoubtedly the politicians in this country don't recognize the difference between a beer like mead and a wine like mead. So does anyone else want to start a mead uprising??!! Well, what ever the case, I sure do.

 

[Yooper]

Here in BC, the meadery laws are really stupid. They basically put mead under the same category of wine, which it is not. And you have to own your own apiary and harvest all of your own honey which you use in your mead (Were the lucky ones, in Ontario they have to have at least 100 bee hives to start a meadery!). This is somewhat understandable if the mead IS like wine, but what if it's a more beer/cider type mead with lower alcohol content? Shouldn't it then be under the same laws of beer and cider who can get all of there ingredients imported if they so like? Undoubtedly the politicians in this country don't recognize the difference between a beer like mead and a wine like mead. So does anyone else want to start a mead uprising??!! Well, what ever the case, I sure do.

Well, I'm not here to argue, but mead is most like wine than any other beverage. Same procedures, same ABV, and really a mead is a "honey wine". The only difference in mead is that it contains honey, while wine contains other sugars.

But the laws in many countries and states/provinces don't usually make sense when it comes to alcohol production and enforcement anyway.

 

[ACbrewer]

In the US the TTB basically says that if it has malt, it is beer, if it has no malt it is wine, unless it is distilled, and then it is a spirit.

Also in the US according to the state, you can start a winnery buying grapes from another source, ie not growing your own.

Anyway in a commercial (and the limit of the US personal production) Mead is a wine, not a beer (no malt).

+1 on the 'laws not making sense'

 

[Bugeaud]

Well here, there's basically two categories. Brewing, which is any type of cider and beer, and wine making, which is any kind of fruit wine, grape wine, or mead. Wouldn't it be better to separate the catagories simply by ABV? On the other hand, one reason to make it harder to start a winery (and in this case a meadery), is in the best interests of large per-existing winery's, which I can't say in any way is fair business, but makes sense none the less, because there is a very large wine industry here (I think they are worried about delicious mead overtaking the grape wine industry). There isn't much big brewing places around here, so they are not as worried about that, so that's why it is much easier to start a brewery.

 

[jaybee]

The alcohol laws in most places are incredibly arbitrary.

So are the conceptual classes of beverages - for example, calling sake 'rice wine' even though it is from a grain, which clearly makes it a beer (or a 'malt liquor' in some places, even though rice is not malted).

I doubt that they are really worried about mead taking away business from a winery - the local alcohol mega-store has 8,000+ types of wine, 2,500 types of beer, and 2 or 3 different meads (and those meads don't sell so well compared to other products). The real issue is that mead is obscure and the people that make laws and policy don't really care much about it.