FDA issues FY 2019 Pesticide Report, reports that pesticide levels remain low in foods

Read the full story at Food Safety Magazine.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has issued its annual Pesticide Residue Monitoring Program Report for FY 2019. FDA tested for 812 pesticides and industrial chemicals across 4,692 total samples. The majority of samples had pesticide residues below the limits (known as “tolerances”) set by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). These results are consistent with the trend of low levels of pesticide residue violations over the past 8 years.

To protect the public, EPA sets tolerance levels on the amounts of pesticides, known as pesticide chemical residues, that may remain in or on some foods, since growers often use pesticides to protect their crops from insects, weeds, fungi, and other pests.