How agriculture can influence content of our food by trying to prevent, destroy, repel or mitigate pest by various substances. See also: Plant Food Contamination, Toxins in Raw Food (natural).

The health benefits of a diet rich in fruits and vegetables outweigh the risks of pesticide exposure. Overall, eating conventionally grown produce is far better than not eating fruits and vegetables at all. But EWG’s Shopper’s Guide can help reduce exposures to pesticides as much as possible for people wisely seeking to eat more fresh fruits and vegetables.

Choose right

You can lower your pesticide exposures by choosing organic or the Clean 15 over the Dirty 12. According to the Environmental Working Group (an organization of scientists, researchers and policymakers), certain types of organic produce can reduce the amount of toxins you consume on a daily basis by as much as 80 percent. 

By organic

"The Dirty Dozen" - 12 fruits and vegetables shown in their tests to contain the highest levels of pesticides (starting with the worst): celery, peaches, strawberries, apples, blueberries (USA), nectarines, sweet bell peppers, spinach + kale + collard greens, cherries, potatoes and grapes (non USA), lettuce.

Extended (+ 7): blueberries (non USA), carrots, green beans (USA), pears, plums (non USA), summer squash, cucumbers (non USA).

Relatively save conventional

"The Clean Fifteen," 15 fruits and vegetables were shown to have little pesticide residue (starting with the lest): onions, avocado, sweet corn (frozen), pineapples, mango, peas (frozen), asparagus, kiwi, cabbage, eggplant, cantaloupe (USA), watermelon, grapefruit, sweet potatoes and honeydew melon.

The lists of dirty and clean produce were compiled after the USDA washed the produce using high-power pressure water systems that many of us could only dream of having in our kitchens.

Richard Wiles, senior vice president of policy for the Environmental Working Group:

If you eat something like a pineapple or sweet corn, they have a protection defense because of the outer layer of skin. Not the same for strawberries and berries.  ...The idea you are going to wash pesticides off is a fantasy. But you should still wash it because you will reduce pesticide exposure.

The President’s Cancer Panel recommends washing conventionally grown produce to remove residues.

Pesticides

A pesticide may be a chemical substance, biological agent (such as a virus or bacterium), antimicrobial, disinfectant or device used against any pest.

In China, an estimated half million people are poisoned by pesticides each year, 500 of whom die.

A new study conducted by the Harvard School of Public Health in Boston, has discovered a 70% increase in the risk of developing Parkinson's disease for people exposed to even low levels of pesticides.

USDA pesticide residue testing finds 70.3 percent of samples contaminated with one or more pesticides. This is 35 times the rate of pollution commonly reported by agribusiness and pesticide interests. The agency found a mixture of between 5 and 13 different pesticide residues tainting one of every 10 samples (10.4%) of fruit or vegetable analyzed.

Some of the most toxic food pesticides have come off the market in the past 15 years. But some pesticides considered safe now will invariably be restricted in future years.

In recent years Americans have eaten at least 8 kinds of fruits and vegetables contaminated with carbofuran [neurotoxic], including asparagus, cantaloupe, cucumbers, green beans, potatoes, sweet bell peppers, summer squash, and watermelon, according to USDA tests conducted from 2001 through 2008.

Chemical agribusiness interests might assert that pesticides in food are perfectly safe, but the reality is that many pesticide uses that are on the books as safe today will be found unsafe by EPA in the future, based on new science, new understandings about the mechanisms by which pesticides can harm the human body, or strengthened policies for health protection within the agency itself.

...We were able to demonstrate that an organic diet provides a dramatic and immediate protective effect against exposures to organophosphorus pesticides that are commonly used in agricultural production.