Now You Can Calculate Pesticide Residues in Fruits & Vegetables

How safe are fruits and vegetables to consume? Are they completely safe? We know that fruits and vegetables are good for health but we should also remember that sometimes they contain pesticides residues. Farmers generally use pesticides for plant protection and plant growth.  

The need of any device to judge the residual quantity was very much in demand. The US-based Alliance for Food and Farming (AFF), a non-profit organization that comprises of both organic and conventional farmers has developed an online pesticide residue calculator to measure the safety of the most popular fruits and vegetables when it concerns pesticide levels. 

The residue calculator features 19 of the most popular fruits and veggies and you can click on a man, woman, teenager or kid to see the number of servings one would have to consume.  For example, a child could eat 181 servings or 1,448 strawberries in a day and still not have any effects from residues.  A child could eat 340 apples in a day. 

These government reports and the UC toxicological analysis underline the diligence of fruit and vegetable farmers when it comes to the sensible use of pesticides approved for organic and conventional crops.  “…growers and farmers are adept at following our comprehensive rules to ensure produce is grown to the highest pesticide standards," says Brian Leahy, Director, California Department of Pesticide Regulation. 

“Based on the PDP data, consumers can feel confident about eating a diet that is rich in fresh fruits and vegetables,” concludes the USDA report. 

Read, learn, choose but consume more organic or conventional fruits and veggies for better health and longer life.  AFF says health experts and scientists overwhelmingly agree that fresh produce, grown either conventionally or organically, is safe to eat for you and your children. 

Not only are conventionally and organically grown fruits and vegetables safe and nutritious, but Americans should also be consuming more of these, not less, if they hope to reduce their risk of cancer, heart disease, diabetes, and obesity. 

When considering the safety of any substance, it is important to understand what is known as a “dose-response relationship,” the AFF said. This means that almost every substance can be toxic at some level. For every product, there is a point, or a dose level, that will not produce a response in a living organism. In the world of pesticide regulation, that point is called the No Observed Adverse Effect Level. 

With the online calculator, this level can be determined for selected fruits and vegetables as it concerns an adult man and woman, and a teen as well as a child. 

When considering the safety of any substance, it is important to understand what is known as a “dose-response relationship,” AFF says. This means that almost every substance — even water or oxygen — can be toxic at some level. For every product, there is a point, or a dose level, that will not produce a response in a living organism. In the world of pesticide regulation, that point is called the No Observed Adverse Effect Level. 

With the online calculator, this level can be determined for selected fruits and vegetables as it concerns an adult man and woman, and a teen as well as a child. 

As for potatoes, the calculator provides the following results for potatoes when we tried it: 

• A man could consume 5141 servings of potatoes in one day without any effect evenif the potatoes have the highest pesticide residue recorded for potatoes by USDA. 

• A woman could consume 3672 servings of potatoes in one day without any effect

• A teen 2938 servings

• A child 1469 servings