Source: theage.com.au via The-Labyrinth on Pinterest
Is eating organic foods better for you than eating conventional? That’s what 16 year-old science student, Ria Chhabra, asked herself when she decided to find out if eating organic really was more beneficial to our health. How did she do this? She used fruit flies, which have 75% of the genes that cause disease in humans. As well, they have a short life span, making them the ideal specimen to test this theory on. She tested levels of fertility, stress resistance, physical activity and longevity, and all three were found to be increased in the ones that were on the organic diet. It’s not like the poor buggers had a choice in the matter; but we do—if finances allow it…
In short:
The Dirty Dozen Plus: Apples, celery, cherry tomatoes, cucumbers, grapes, hot peppers, nectarines, peaches, potatoes, spinach, strawberries, sweet bell peppers, kale and collard greens, zucchini.
The Clean Fifteen: Asparagus, avocados, cabbage, rockmelon, sweet corn, eggplant, grapefruit, kiwi, mangoes, mushrooms, papaya, onions, pineapples, sweet peas, sweet potatoes.
Read more from The Age
“The health benefits of a diet rich in fruits and vegetables outweigh the risks of pesticide exposure. Use EWG’s Shopper’s Guide to Pesticides™ to reduce your exposures as much as possible, but eating conventionally-grown produce is far better than not eating fruits and vegetables at all. The Shopper’s Guide to Pesticides in Produce™ will help you determine which fruits and vegetables have the most pesticide residues and are the most important to buy organic. You can lower your pesticide intake by avoiding the 12 most contaminated fruits and vegetables and choosing the least contaminated produce.”
How important is eating organic to you?
Read more from EWG, here
Watch ‘Exposures to Pesticides in Produce’,here
Food Fraud. What Are You Really Eating?
Sarah Wilson’s I Quit Sugar Cookbook
I prefer organics. It is very important to me to avoid as much additional pesticides and chemicals as possible. Dr. William Rea talks about our toxic load. Consuming less chemicals in our food certainly must help with our toxic load.
Thank you for being so pro-active and sharing this information with us.
I do too. But lately, I’ve had to choose fresh over organics. Some shops keep the food too long and I get effected by mould. But I do try to follow that dirty dozen advice. Green leafy items: always organic.
Thank you too.
The trouble with “fresh” fruit and veges today isn’t just the pesticides, it’s the frankenfood, the GM produce. Things like corn which are on the “clean” list are more than likely GM these days. Have you ever checked out the Australia and NZ Food standards website? Here is the link for GM foods http://www.foodstandards.gov.au/consumerinformation/gmfoods/
When you explore this site you can’t help but feel quite sick at the scientific bias and lack of any real protection for the Australian consumer. I have also checked out the “standard 1.5.2” and the “approvals” sections and am appalled at where our country is headed.
This Dirty dozen list is American, I would dearly like to see a list for Australia. It’s great to be informed about these things though and I am grateful for the hard-working crusaders like yourself who keep getting this information to us. Thank you and keep up the good work 🙂
Do you think organic corn would be GM? I don’t, because the organics industry have rules and guidelines to abide by. I do know that Dieticians recommend foods that they are paid to tell us are good for us, like sugar, low-fat, and probably, GM. And no-one, apart from authors and bloggers, in Australia distributes information about GM. I know that some manufacturers will label their food GM free though. Just to show how muzzled our ‘professionals’ are, these links, from Sara Wilson’s blog, highlight the various multinational sugar-based and low-fat companies that fund the major nutritional bodies in Australia and the US.
American Society of Nutrition
American Dietetics Association
Australian Dietetics Association
International Diabetes Federation
Australian Heart Foundation
It would be the same for GM foods.
You’re right about the list. Even most of our fragrance information comes from the US and Canada. I guess it’s up to us assimilate and distribute it the best way we can.
I wonder who we could contact about creating a Dirty Dozen list for Australia? I can’t believe we don’t have one.
Thank you, Heather.