Are there pesticides on your food?

Here are lists of the best and worst

This article was published on 03.18.10

Which fruits and vegetables are relatively low—or high—in residual pesticides? It’s hard to know. Fortunately, the Environmental Working Group has sifted through some 87,000 tests the USDA and the FDA have done between 2002 and 2007 on the 47 most commonly eaten fruits and vegetables. Here are its “Dirty Dozen” and “Clean 15”:

Dirty Dozen
Buy these organic

Rank Fruit or Veggie
1 (worst) Peach 100 (highest pesticide load)
2 Apple
3 Sweet Bell Pepper
4 Celery
5 Nectarine
6 Strawberries
7 Cherries
8 Kale
9 Lettuce
10 Grapes-Imported
11 Carrot
12 Pear

Clean 15
Lowest in pesticides

Rank Fruit or Veggie
1 (best) Onion
2 Avocado
3 Sweet Corn-Frozen
4 Pineapple
5 Mango
6 Asparagus
7 Sweet Peas-Frozen
8 Kiwi
9 Cabbage
10 Eggplant
11 Papaya
12 Watermelon
13 Broccoli
14 Tomato
15 Sweet Potato

Source: Environmental Working Group (www.foodnews.org)