The Dirty Dozen Foods

Find the Right Product for You

Sign up for our Newsletter

Free Shipping on Orders over $125.00

The Dirty Dozen Foods

Most Contaminated: THE DIRTY DOZEN

Consistent with two previous EWG investigations, fruits topped the list of the consistently most contaminated fruits and vegetables, with seven of the 12 most contaminated foods. The seven were peaches leading the list, then apples, nectarines and strawberries, cherries, and imported grapes, and pears. Among these seven fruits:

Nectarines had the highest percentage of samples test positive for pesticides (97.3 percent), followed by peaches (96.7 percent) and apples (94.1 percent).
Peaches had the highest likelihood of multiple pesticides on a single sample - 87.0 percent had two or more pesticide residues � followed by nectarines (85.3 percent) and apples (82.3 percent).
Peaches and apples had the most pesticides detected on a single sample, with nine pesticides on a single sample, followed by strawberries and imported grapes where eight pesticides were found on a single sample of each fruit.
Peaches had the most pesticides overall, with some combination of up to 53 pesticides found on the samples tested, followed by apples with 50 pesticides and strawberries with 38.

Sweet bell peppers, celery, kale, lettuce, and carrots are the vegetables most likely to expose consumers to pesticides. Among these five vegetables:

Celery had the highest of percentage of samples test positive for pesticides (94.1 percent), followed by sweet bell peppers (81.5 percent) and carrots (82.3 percent).
Celery also had the highest likelihood of multiple pesticides on a single vegetable (79.8 percent of samples), followed by sweet bell peppers (62.2 percent) and kale (53.1 percent).
Sweet bell peppers had the most pesticides detected on a single sample (11 found on one sample), followed by kale (10 found on one sample), then lettuce and celery (both with nine).
Sweet bell peppers were the vegetable with the most pesticides overall, with 64, followed by lettuce with 57 and carrots with 40.

Least Contaminated: THE CLEAN FIFTEEN

The vegetables least likely to have pesticides on them are onions, sweet corn, asparagus, sweet peas, cabbage, eggplant, broccoli, tomatoes, and sweet potatoes.

Over half of the tomatoes (53.1 percent), broccoli (65.2 percent), eggplant (75.4 percent), cabbage (82.1 percent), and sweet pea (77.1 percent) samples had no detectable pesticides. Among the other three vegetables on the least-contaminated list (asparagus, sweet corn, and onions), there were no detectable residues on 90 percent or more of the samples.
Multiple pesticide residues are extremely rare on any of these least contaminated vegetables. Tomatoes had the highest likelihood, with a 13.5 percent chance of more than one pesticide when ready to eat. Onions and corn both had the lowest chance with zero samples containing more than one pesticide.
The greatest number of pesticides detected on a single sample of any of these low-pesticide vegetables was five (as compared to 11 found on sweet bell peppers, the vegetable with the most residues on a single sample).
Broccoli had the most pesticides found on a single type of vegetable, with up to 28 pesticides, but far fewer than the most contaminated vegetable, sweet bell peppers, on which 64 were found.

The fruits least likely to have pesticide residues on them are avocados, pineapples, mangoes, kiwi, papayas, watermelon and grapefruit.

Fewer than 10 percent of pineapple, mango, and avocado samples had detectable pesticides on them, and fewer than one percent of samples had more than one pesticide residue.
Though 54.5 percent of grapefruit had detectable pesticides, multiple residues are less common, with only 17.5 percent of samples containing more than one residue. Watermelon had residues on 28.1 percent of samples, and just 9.6 percent had multiple pesticide residues.

The Full List: 47 Fruits & Veggies

RANK	FRUIT OR VEGGIE	SCORE
1 (worst)	Peach	100 (highest pesticide load)
2	Apple	93
3	Sweet Bell Pepper	83
4	Celery	82
5	Nectarine	81
6	Strawberries	80
7	Cherries	73
8	Kale	69
9	Lettuce	67
10	Grapes - Imported	66
11	Carrot	63
12	Pear	63
13	Collard Greens	60
14	Spinach	58
15	Potato	56
16	Green Beans	53
17	Summer Squash	53
18	Pepper	51
19	Cucumber	50
20	Raspberries	46
21	Grapes - Domestic	44
22	Plum	44
23	Orange	44
24	Cauliflower	39
25	Tangerine	37
26	Mushrooms	36
27	Banana	34
28	Winter Squash	34
29	Cantaloupe	33
30	Cranberries	33
31	Honeydew Melon	30
32	Grapefruit	29
33	Sweet Potato	29
34	Tomato	29
35	Broccoli	28
36	Watermelon	26
37	Papaya	20
38	Eggplant	20
39	Cabbage	17
40	Kiwi	13
41	Sweet Peas - Frozen	10
42	Asparagus	10
43	Mango	9
44	Pineapple	7
45	Sweet Corn - Frozen	2
46	Avocado	1
47 (best)	Onion	1 (lowest pesticide load)

Note: We ranked a total of 47 different fruits and vegetables but grapes are listed twice because we looked at both domestic and imported samples.

You can download this list and an App for your IPhone at http://www.foodnews.org/