A growing number of consumers are choosing organic fruits and vegetables as a way to avoid pesticides and support sustainable farming practices. However, organics are not always accessible or affordable for everyone, leaving consumers wondering how to enjoy the nutritional benefits of produce while limiting exposure to harmful chemicals.

This is where the Environmental Working Group’s Shopper’s Guide to Pesticides in Produce really comes in handy. EWG researchers compile data from pesticide residue tests conducted by USDA and FDA scientists on 28,000 samples of 48 popular fruits and vegetables.

Based on these results, the most contaminated produce makes up EWG’s “Dirty Dozen^TM” list and those with the lowest potential for chemical residue make up the “Clean Fifteen.” By putting this important information in the hands of consumers, we can all minimize our toxic load.

Here are some of the highlights from this year’s guide:

Dirty Dozen Plus:

EWG's ranking uses six measures of pesticide hazards including the number of pesticides detected on a crop and the percent of samples testing positive. The “Plus” produce did not meet the Dirty Dozen criteria but were frequently contaminated with pesticides that are exceptionally toxic to the nervous system.

• Apples
• Celery
• Cherry tomatoes
• Cucumbers
• Grapes
• Hot peppers
• Nectarines – imported
• Peaches
• Potatoes
• Spinach
• Strawberries
• Sweet bell peppers
• Kale/collard greens +
• Summer squash +

Clean Fifteen:

• Asparagus
• Avocados
• Cabbage
• Cantaloupe
• Sweet corn
• Eggplant
• Grapefruit
• Kiwi
• Mangos
• Mushrooms
• Onions
• Papayas
• Pineapples
• Sweet peas – frozen
• Sweet potatoes

It’s important to note that residue tests are conducted on produce that has been washed and/or peeled depending on how it is typically eaten. For examples, bananas, avocados and oranges are washed and peeled before testing, but leafy greens or grapes are only washed.

Get the Guide

For more test results and ways to reduce your exposure to pesticide residue, download the full report: EWG’s 2013 Shopper’s Guide to Pesticides in Produce.

Sources:

Environmental Working Group

Food Marketing Institute

With more than 30 million shipments of food from foreign countries, almost 80% of the U.S. seafood and two-thirds of its produce is foreign-sourced revealing that food safety is a global challenge.

A recent analysis of international food sources by the watchdog organization Food Sentry reveals the most frequent food safety violators as well as the nature of the problems found.  

For the study, the researchers examined nearly 1,000 incident reports from 73 countries over a one-year period.

Worst Offenders:

According to the data, the top ten most frequent offenders were:

1. China
2. United States
3. India
4. Vietnam
5. Japan
6. Dominican Republic
7. Thailand
8. Turkey
9. Brazil and France (tied)
10. Indonesia and Spain (tied)

It is important to note that the top five countries export significant amounts of food to other countries. Therefore their food products get tested more, leading to their place in the top five.

Biggest Problems:

In most countries, except the U.S., pesticide residue was the number one safety problem. Over 32 distinct pesticides were found in Chinese foods, mostly in produce, fruit and spices. One cumin sample had six different pesticides.

Among U.S. exports, Listeria monocytogenes contamination, followed by the presence of various types of mycotoxin were most prevalent.

Other frequent problems included:

• Heavy metal contamination (cadmium, lead or mercury). Examples included kelp, cinnamon, crab, and infant formula.
• Excessive use of antibiotics was common in exports from China and Vietnam, particularly seafood products.
• Overuse of chemical additives such as preservatives and dyes. Examples including sulfur dioxide, formaldehyde, and sodium hydroxide.

While not necessarily a safety risk, the researchers also documented a high rate of economically motivated adulteration, or “food fraud” in Chinese imports. This practice involves substituting a cheaper ingredient for the real thing.

Foodborne Illness Risks

Currently one out of six Americans will experience food poisoning this year. In recent years, audits of FDA inspection rates indicated that 56% of domestic food manufacturers have not been inspected in five or more years. Furthermore the overall number of inspections and citations has declined.

As for food imports, the FDA only inspects about 2% of all incoming foods.

Sources:

Food Navigator

Food Sentry

Dallas News

In 1990 The Organic Foods Production Act gave the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) the authority to require periodic residue testing in organic production. However, an audit by the USDA Office of Inspector General in 2010 that visited four certifying agents revealed that none conducted this testing.

In response, a new USDA requirement that goes in effect January 1, 2013 will require that certifying agencies test for non-organic residue in samples from at least 5% of the organic farms and processors they certify.

This will create a minimum level of testing where none existed before.

The new requirement lets the certifying agencies decide what types of samples (pre-harvest, post-harvest, or finished product) will be tested to determine if pesticide residue, arsenic or other chemicals, genetic engineering, synthetic hormones, antibiotics or other banned substances in organic production are present. The tests, estimated to cost $500 each, would be paid for by the certifying organizations, not their clients.

Before this rule was adopted, the USDA had considered a 25% minimum testing requirement. Following a public comment period on the proposed rule, the USDA settled for a 5% minimum.

“This level was chosen to ensure that all certifying agents, regardless of the number of operations they certify, are responsible for some level of regular residue testing at reasonable cost,” USDA wrote in its Federal Register notice announcing the rule.

Sources:

Whole Foods Magazine

Delta Farm Press

The non-profit organization Environmental Working Group (EWG) just released its 2012 Shopper’s Guide to Pesticides in Produce that reveals the total pesticide load for 46 popular fruits and vegetables. The guide also includes new information on pesticides in baby food and drinking water.

The EWG guide is famous for listing the worst offenders, dubbed the “Dirty Dozen,” as well as the produce with the least pesticide residue, called the “Clean Fifteen.”

It’s important to note that these lists are based on data from the USDA pesticide testing program. The produce is washed and/or peeled prior to testing so the amount of chemicals detected represents what would be consumed.

Dirty Dozen Plus

These fruits and vegetables are best to buy organic.

1. Apples – 98% of conventionally grown apples had pesticides
2. Celery – Highly contaminated, celery tested positive for 57 different pesticides
3. Sweet Bell Peppers – Up to 15 pesticides were found on a single sample
4. Peaches
5. Strawberries -- Thirteen different pesticides were measured on a single sample of strawberries.
6. Nectarines (imported) -- Every single nectarine tested had measurable pesticide residues
7. Grapes -- As a category, grapes have more types of pesticides than any other fruit, with 64 different chemicals
8. Spinach
9. Lettuce -- Seventy-eight different pesticides were found on lettuce samples 
10. Cucumbers
11. Blueberries -- Domestic blueberries tested positive for 42 different pesticide residues
12. Potatoes

Plus: Green Beans and Leafy Greens (including Kale and Collard Greens)

This year EWG expanded the Dirty Dozen with a “Plus” category to highlight two crops -- green beans and leafy greens, meaning, kale and collard greens because they contain pesticides of special concern. They are commonly contaminated with organophosphate insecticides that are highly toxic to the nervous system.

Clean Fifteen

More than 90 percent of cabbage, asparagus, sweet peas, eggplant and sweet potato samples had one or fewer pesticides detected. Of all the fruits and vegetables on the “clean” list, no single sample had more than 5 different chemicals detected.

1. Onions – Less that 1% of samples had any pesticides
2. Sweet Corn – Ninety-eight percent of samples had no detectable pesticide residues
3. Pineapples
4. Avocado
5. Cabbage
6. Sweet Peas
7. Asparagus
8. Mangos
9. Eggplant
10. Kiwi
11. Cantaloupe (domestic)
12. Sweet Potatoes
13. Grapefruit
14. Watermelon
15. Mushrooms

Pesticides in Baby Foods

New to EWG’s guide this year are the results of USDA testing of about 190 samples of prepared baby food consisting of green beans, pears and sweet potatoes.

Nearly all pear samples (92%) had at least one type of pesticide residue with 26% of samples containing five or more pesticides. A total of 15 different pesticides were found among the samples. One of the pesticides detected, iprodione, is categorized by the EPA as a probable human carcinogen and is not approved for use on pears.  Its presence in the sample constitutes a violation of federal law.

The green bean baby food  tested positive for five pesticides including organophosphates which were found in nearly 10% of samples.

The only good news in baby food testing:  sweet potatoes sold as baby food had virtually no detectable pesticide residues.

Pesticides on Tap

Also new to the guide are the results of USDA testing for pesticides, herbicides and other agricultural chemicals in community drinking water systems that use surface water such as reservoirs, lakes or rivers as their water sources.

Tests of 284 samples from 12 different water systems found:

• The presence of 65 pesticides or their metabolites
• The toxic herbicide atrazine or its metabolites in every single sample
• The herbicides 2,4-D and metolachlor in more than 70 percent of the samples
• Six other pesticides in at least half the samples

Get the Guide

For more test results and ways to reduce your exposure to pesticide residue, download the full report:  EWG’s 2012 Shopper’s Guide to Pesticides in Produce.

Source:

Environmental Working Group

Need any more reasons to justify avoiding conventionally grown foods that are often tainted with pesticides to your friends or family? Next time you feel the sarcasm coming on, send those naysayers a link to today's blog item, a French study about the growing risk of dementia linked to long-term exposure to pesticides among vineyard workers in their middle and Baby Boomer years.

Scientists compared the initial results of questionnaires and nine neurobehavioral tests that measured verbal and language skills, reaction times and memory of 1,000 farm workers in 1997-98 to a subset of 600 workers who completed a second round of tests between 2001-03.

Even though scientists blamed lower test scores on old age, depression, drug use, excessive alcohol use and poor education, the link to pesticide exposure was clear. In seven of the nine cognitive exams administered during the second round of testing, patients exposed to pesticides had lower scores. In fact, workers exposed to pesticides were five times more likely to have lower scores on both sets of tests.

The real concern: Patients exposed to pesticides were at twice the risk of experiencing drops of two points in the mini-mental state examination or Folstein test, a 30-point questionnaire used to screen people for dementia.

Researchers were alarmed by the drop in cognitive test scores as a direct result of pesticide exposure, particularly due to the relatively short gap between testing and the young age of farm workers. All the more reason to choose organic whole foods over conventionally grown ones as often as you can.

Occupational and Environmental Medicine November 22, 2010

ScienceDaily December 2, 2010

Yahoo News December 1, 2010

A British review of 162 studies (spanning a half-century) came to the conclusion a year ago that there was no evidence of any nutritional differences between organic whole foods and conventionally grown ones. The review spurred much debate in the scientific world and left a great many health-conscious shoppers wondering if the organic versus conventional argument was even relevant.

At the time, we pointed out that the British review never took into account how conventional whole foods may or may not be affected by their exposure to pesticides, leaving great room for doubt. Our skepticism was more than justified, based on this recent study comparing three varieties of commercial strawberries grown in California on 13 organic and 13 conventional fields for nutritional value, taste and quality as well as soil DNA and biological and chemical soil properties over two years.

Long story short, organic strawberries and the fields in which they were grown were equal to or better than conventionally grown fruits and fields in almost every way. For example, on the fruit side, organic strawberries lasted a half-day longer than conventional strawberries, a surprise to some experts who assumed chemically treated conventional varieties would repel mold longer. Organic berries contained greater concentrations of ascorbic acid and phenolic compounds and higher antioxidant activity. And, they tasted better too.

The organic soils in which those strawberries grew were also superior to conventional fields in key biological and chemical properties, including micronutrients, enzymes, nitrogen and microbial biomass, and possessed a greater number of genes and more genetic diversity. (Watch a video about this study with lead researcher Dr. John Reganold, a soil scientist at Washington State University University.)

Maybe, it's time to take the Environmental Working Group's latest lists of the Dirty Dozen and Clean 15 fruits and vegetables with you next time to the grocery store…

PLoS One September 1, 2010 Free Full Text Study

PhysORG.com September 1, 2010

The Seattle Times September 2, 2010

Whole Foods Market's announcement about taking their first steps toward limiting genetically-modified organisms (GMOs) from their stores in America sounds far more hopeless and unrealistic today than it did a year ago, based on a report from a group of ecologists at the recent 95th meeting of the Ecological Society of America (ESA) in Pittsburgh.

The gist: Despite assurances from the Agri-Business sector, scientists discovered GM yellow canola plants "growing in the middle of nowhere" North Dakota, in places far away from conventional and GM crops, that are resistant to herbicides made by Monsanto (glyphosate) and Bayer Crop Science (gluphosinate) and, in two cases, to both substances.

GM samples of the canola/rapeseed plant (Brassica napus) were found at almost half of the 288 sites scientists investigated along North Dakota roads. Of the roughly 140 sites and 406 plants collected in the state, 347 were genetically modified to resist either pesticide. And, two plant samples showed signs of stacked traits, meaning resistance to both pesticides.

Here's a sobering thought from a University of Arkansas scientist about the evolving genetic makeup of native plants, as told to Scientific American: This is a good model for the influence of agriculture on the evolution of native plants. We can imagine gene flow to native species. If we can imagine that happening, it probably happens.

Evidence for the establishment and persistence of genetically modified canola populations in the U.S (95th ESA Annual Meeting Abstract) August 6, 2010

Discover/80 Beats Blog August 6, 2010

Scientific American.com August 6, 2010

Nature News.com August 6, 2010

You may recall a recent study I posted in this space that should've eliminated any doubts about the health value of consuming organic foods in large quantities. Just because X food has an organic label -- thanks, in part, to the use of organic pesticides -- doesn't mean you should eat more of it than one formulated from conventional sources and grown with conventional pesticides.

The same analogy may also, unfortunately, be true about the environmental impact associated with using greater amounts of organic pesticides over conventional ones, according to a new study.

Scientists compared the environmental impact of six different pesticides, including two organic formulations, at five different sites over two years to control the spread of soybean aphids and observed how well each pesticide affected the health of flower bugs and ladybugs (both predators of aphids).

Out of all the pesticides tested, an organic, mineral oil solution had the greatest impact, necessitating higher amounts be sprayed on plants to smother aphids. Also, the "less harmful" mineral oil and fungal pesticides killed more of the natural predators that got rid of aphids. To do what's best for the environment, "It's important to look at every compound and make a selection based on the environmental impact quotient, rather than if it's simply natural or synthetic," scientists say.

PLoS One June 22, 2010 Free Full Text Study

ScienceDaily June 23, 2010

There weren't many changes in the Environmental Working Group's (EWG) 2010 lists of the Dirty Dozen and Clean 15 fruits and vegetables from last year (download the newest wallet-sized list). You could make a very convincing argument, however, that expanding both to 18 or 20 would've captured most of the foods listed for the past two years.

EWG issues these lists every spring, based on the amount of pesticides contained in vegetables and fruits, to a great deal of media hoopla, and deservedly so. This non-profit watchdog has made it very easy to clip these lists to your weekly grocery lists, or in our case to download both as a free iPhone app (the 2010 lists aren't yet available as an app), to safeguard your health.

For the record, lettuce, carrots and pears were replaced on the Dirty Dozen list with potatoes, blueberries (domestically grown) and spinach. On the Clean 15 list, honeydew melons, grapefruit and cantaloupes replaced papayas, tomatoes and broccoli.

But, if you take a look at the entire list of 49 fruits and vegetables, you'll see that adding six more to both the dirty and clean lists would've included all but one from last year's groups. Yes, we're splitting hairs a tiny bit, but not the inherent value of these lists, which should be a HUGE wake-up call for you to seek out locally grown and organic foods as often as you can. And, be especially careful to avoid the dirty foods that may infiltrate your grocery store too.

Receive Daily Health Updates from CNCA Subscribe to Our Blog: RSS or Email

Yahoo Green April 28, 2010

Unfortunately, fraud isn't the only problem with our nation's food supply, according to a recent U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) audit that found beef tainted with heavy metals, pesticides and veterinary antibiotics is being sold in American grocery stores.

The problem isn't just the porous testing of processed foods we eat every day (remember last year's salmonella outbreak in peanut butter). The real issue is a lack of regulation by the FDA and EPA that has failed to set even minimal limits on human exposure to potential hazardous substances, like heavy metals (copper and arsenic) and veterinary drugs (flunixin, a non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug given to horses and cattle).

Even worse, this lack of standards prevents the USDA's Food Safety and Inspection Services (FSIS) from doing anything about the problem, even when it discovers higher-than-normal levels of vet drugs or pesticides in meat.

This disconnect became very apparent two years ago, when one shipment of beef was rejected for sale in Mexico because the amount of copper detected by food regulators there exceeded the country's own standards. Unfortunately, due to the lack of any federal oversight on copper in America, FSIS couldn't prevent that food manufacturer from reselling that heavy metal-laden beef in America.

The U.S. House is considering a bill that would set limits on seven antibiotics commonly used by farmers. That said, isn't this attention coming a bit late in the game?

USA Today April 15, 2010

Food Safety News April 14, 2010

One of the best ways to improve the health of your family is also one of the easiest things you can do: Buy organically grown foods as often as you can find and afford them. That said, you may get some arguments from "experts" on the airwaves who have cited a recent British study that concluded there was no nutritional difference between more costly organic and conventionally grown foods.

When a friend or family member tells you how costly organic foods are in comparison to their perceived health value, however, remind them the study in question didn't measure the toxic load of pesticides contained in conventionally grown foods which can be considerable, according to a report from The Organic Center.

A great source for affordable and healthy whole foods is your neighborhood farmer's market. If you don't know where to find them in your area, you'll want to check out our recent story on farmers markets.

And, if you need any more convincing about the true value of organic foods to your health, watch this interesting video based on research by the Environmental Working Group to help you avoid the "Dirty Dozen" foods.

You may have heard pundits discussing the findings of a British review of studies (source link below) that debates the nutritional value of organic foods versus those that are conventionally grown. After reviewing 162 studies published over a 50-year period (1958-2008), researchers found "no evidence of a difference in nutrient content between organically and conventionally produced foodstuffs," according to the report.

The main differences that were mentioned: Conventionally produced crops contained significantly higher amounts of nitrogen while organic crops had much more phosphorus and higher volumes of acidity. Those results only explain part of the story...

Unfortunately, the study sidestepped the presence of pesticides in foods, a point driven home by a 2006 Environmental Health Perspectives study that concluded organic diets reduced such exposures dramatically -- particularly malathion and chlorpyrifos -- among children.

Moreover, a trio of experts came to radically different conclusions about the superior nutritional value of organic foods, using another methodology and narrowing the span of their review of studies to the 1980s.

American Journal of Clinical Nutrition July 29, 2009

Seattle Times August 5, 2009

healthfinder.gov July 29, 2009