Pesticides in bananas up to 6 residues per fruit are these three brands -

Salvagente test on 15 banana samples reveals 3 brands that contain the most pesticides and promote organic

Pesticides in bananas: Up to 6 residues in one fruit, the three most common

Sixty bananas a year each.This is what all Italians eat on average, a fruit that ends up in the shopping cart almost out of habit, considered healthy, practical to eat, suitable even for the little ones.But still few know that conventional bananas are one of the most chemically treated fruits in the world, to the point of being nicknamed “chemical fruit” in South American plantations.And that's not an exaggeration.

Il Salvagente recently published the results of research on 15 samples of bananas bought in Italian supermarkets and discount stores, analyzed in laboratories to detect pesticide residues in the pulp.

The findings are no surprise to those familiar with the supply chain, but give pause to those who buy them, especially children.What did the analyzes find?A typical fruit has been found to contain traces of up to six pesticides, substances banned in Europe and endocrine disruptors in some top-selling brands.And compared to the last survey conducted four years ago, almost nothing has changed.

Because girls have pesticides

To understand why so much waste is accumulating in this fruit, we must start from afar. World production of bananas, the fifth largest food on Earth, is based almost entirely on intensive monocultures in Latin America, with Ecuador alone accounting for 30% of global exports. The entire supply chain has historically been in the hands of a few large multinational groups.

The treatment starts with the soil, continues by spraying the plant from the air (which, due to the effect of the wind, often pollutes the surrounding organic crops), then extends to the fruit itself: from the fourth month of growth to the harvest, the trees are wrapped in plastic bags that release pesticides and fungicides.

But this is not the end.After harvesting, bananas are cut and the cut is treated with fungicide, then washed with chlorine solution and subjected to other chemical treatments to reduce ripening during transportation.Still green and immature when they arrive in European ports, they are eventually exposed to ethylene, a plant hormone, which accelerates ripening and turns the skin yellow.A long and chemically intense journey, which well explains the nickname "Fruta Quimica".

What the test found

All 15 analyzed samples were found to be formally compliant with legal restrictions. As such, legal compliance does not tell the whole story: some of the molecules found are endocrine disruptors, which can act in the body even at very low concentrations, and the question of the so-called "cocktail effect", i.e. the combined effect of several pesticides simultaneously present in the same fruit, remains open.

The most worrying substances found in the tested bananas are:

- Bifenthrin: an insecticide recognized as an endocrine disruptor for humans, banned in Europe on almost all crops.In the case of bananas it is allowed as an exception - with a very low of 0.1 mg / kg - for "import tolerance" reasons: basically, multinational companies in the sector have received a special discount from the EU, which says they have no other options.

- Eposaconazole: fungicide classified as potentially carcinogenic, banned from food sales in the European Union from 2020. Found in trace amounts (below analytical detection limit) in 2 samples

- Imidacloprid: A neonicotinoid insecticide banned by the EU in 2018 that is known to be linked to bee deaths.It also appears in the lines in the analyzed samples.

- Azoxystrobin: fungicide usually applied by aerial spray, inhalation toxicity.It is the most frequent molecule: found in 8 out of 15 laboratories.

- Thiabendazole: a post-harvest fungicide classified by the US EPA as a probable carcinogen and endocrine disruptor.

Other substances identified: fenpropimorph, pyriproxyfen (suspected endocrine disruptor) and fludioxonil (suspected carcinogen according to the European Agency ECHA).

organically enhanced bananas

The seven biological samples included in the analysis presented very good results.Three of them - Esselunga Ultramercato, Konad Bio and Todis Bio - were completely free of any pesticide residues.Another four fossil samples showed only faint traces, below technical detection limits, related to "runoff" from the general surrounding vegetation sprayed by the wind.

This is an important confirmation: choosing organic bananas is a great choice.

How estimates are made for different types of bananas

Il Salvagente ha valutato ogni campione tenendo conto non solo della presenza dei pesticidi, ma anche delle loro concentrazioni e del profilo di rischio di ciascuna molecola.

Pesticides are fined in Europe for other crops, which are banned by the EU if they are found only in parts, those that are per million active lower than the legal limits that are penalized - a sign that the safety limit is not wide - and the number of different molecules found in the same product.

Le 3 banane peggiori

Tra i campioni convenzionali esaminati, quelli che sono risultati contenere più pesticidi, tutti provenienti dalla Costa Rica, sono i seguenti:

- Del Monte (€2.88/kg) is the most problematic sample in terms of amount and concentration of residues: azoxystrobin at a dose of 0.160 mg/kg, thiabendazole at a dose of 0.408 mg/kg - the highest dose of all the tested products, within the maximum legal limit of 6 mg/kg - as well as bifenthrin at a dose of 0.03 mg/kg bifenthrin at a dose of 0.03 mg/kg bifenthrin inat a dose of 0.03 mg/kg. more traces cannot be quantified.Five presences in one fruit, including endocrine-disrupting pesticides that are banned from almost all other crops in Europe.

- Carrefour (€1.66/kg) contains four residues, plus traces: azoxystrobin 0.113 mg/kg, bifenthrin 0.013 mg/kg, pyriproxyfen 0.037 mg/kg and thiabendazole 0.084 mg/kg.Bifenthrin, the endocrine-disrupting insecticide that is only allowed in bananas with a commercial exemption, also appears here.

- Esselunga Itacu (€0.98/kg) contains azoxystrobin 0.063 mg/kg, bifenthrin 0.016 mg/kg, fenpropimorph 0.014 mg/kg, pyriproxyfen 0.075 mg/kg, plus two additional traces.A total of six presences, the highest number among the three that make this fruit a symbolic example of the so-called cocktail effect, whose long-term consequences are still not fully understood by science.

It is worth noting an important fact: Del Monte is the most expensive product in the test among the common ones, about 3 euros per kilo, but it is the one that worries the most on the web.The price, in this case, is not a guarantee of quality or safety.

The full survey with reviews of 15 products is available in the Salvagente issue on newsstands.

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