The worst supermarket fruit and veg for pesticides
Tests have revealed the fruits and vegetables most affected by pesticide mixtures potentially linked to cancer.
Using data published by The government at the beginning of this winterThe Pesticide Action Network (Pan) UK has identified 12 foodstuffs as being at risk of a “cocktail effect”; This means that mixing several pesticides together increases the toxicity level of the chemicals.
While the government’s health and safety food monitoring programs concluded that the vast majority of samples tested contained safe levels of pesticides, Pan UK said the report only tested individual pesticides and not a mixture.
Grapes were found to be the worst of all the food groups, with a sample containing residues of at least 16 different pesticides. At least 90 percent of the 108 grape samples tested contained more than one pesticide.
A grape seed sample from Türkiye contained man-made “forever” PFA chemicals, which are toxins that do not break down naturally in the body and accumulate, causing cancer and environmental damage.
Grapefruit fared poorly, with nearly 99 percent of samples found to contain more than one pesticide residue. One sample was found to contain 10 different species.
Other foods affected included 79 percent of 24 lemon samples, 67 percent of 73 banana samples, 49 percent of 96 sweet pepper samples, and 46 percent of 97 melon samples. While 11 different pesticides were found in hot peppers, eight different pesticides were found in a broccoli sample.
Beans, mushrooms, eggplants and haricot beans were also supposedly included in this list. “dirty dozen”.
“We found that a quarter of vegetables and three-quarters of fruit contained more than one pesticide,” Pan UK wrote.
He explained that 123 different chemicals were found in the 17 types of fruits and vegetables tested, 42 of which were pesticides linked to cancer and 21 known to interfere with hormone systems that could potentially lead to birth defects, developmental disorders and reproductive problems.
The government’s food monitoring programs tested a total of 1,153,009 food and pesticide combinations, each testing 3,482 samples for the appropriate range of pesticides.
Research across the UK found that 51.26 per cent of samples contained none of the residues the programs were looking for, and 46.67 per cent contained residues at or below the maximum residue limit. Only 2.07 percent of samples had residue above this limit, according to the report.
But Pan UK argued the limits should be reassessed because they did not take into account chemicals exposed through plastic food packaging and water.
Around 29 per cent of pesticides found during testing are not approved for use by British farmers but can leak into the food system when imported from outside the UK.
A spokesperson for the Ministry of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs said: Independent: “We have imposed strict limits on pesticide residues, determined after stringent risk assessments, to ensure safe levels for the public. These limits apply to both domestically produced and imported food from other countries.”
