Caroline recently sent me an article about organic food from Consumer Reports. The article is a very interesting read since it details what is and is not allowed for foods labelled “organic,” and, more importantly, some efforts by big agribusinesses to undermine those rules in favor of profit. But I want to focus on two smaller quotes from the article. First,
Organic fruits and vegetables are farmed with botanical or primarily nonsynthetic pest controls quickly broken down by sunlight and oxygen, instead of long-lasting synthetic chemicals. Organic produce sometimes carries chemical residues because of pesticides that are now pervasive in groundwater and rain, but their chemical load is much lower.
According to the Environmental Working Group (EWG), a research and advocacy organization in Washington, D.C., eating the 12 most contaminated fruits and vegetables exposes you to about 20 pesticides a day on average. If you eat the 12 least contaminated, you’re exposed to about two pesticides a day.
Even eating the least contaminated food exposes you to, on average, multiple pesticides per day because the stuff is as much a part of groundwater and rain as, well, the water itself. Is that not shocking? This article sort of tosses it out there like they’re saying the sky is blue. But it’s why advocate organic foods even if the direct health impact over regular foods to me is minimal: it’s just getter for the Earth and for everyone in general.