Starbucks

Former Seattle Police Chief Organizes for Marijuana Legalization (and talks a little bit about the Seattle '99)

Palm oil frenzy threatens to wipe out orangutans

From Yahoo! News.

TANJUNG PUTING NATIONAL PARK, Indonesia – Hoping to unravel the mysteries of human origin, anthropologist Louis Leakey sent three young women to Africa and Asia to study our closest relatives: It was chimpanzees for Jane Goodall, mountain gorillas for Dian Fossey and the elusive, solitary orangutans for Birute Mary Galdikas.

Nearly four decades later, 62-year-old Galdikas, the least famous of his "angels," is the only one still at it. And the red apes she studies in Indonesia are on the verge of extinction because forests are being clear-cut and burned to make way for lucrative palm oil plantations.

Galdikas worries many questions may never be answered. How long do orangutans live in the wild? How far do the males roam? And how many mates do they have in their lifetime?

"I try not to get depressed, I try not to get burned out," says the Canadian scientist, pulling a wide-rimmed jungle hat over her shoulder-length gray hair in Tanjung Puting National Park. She gently leans over to pick up a tiny orangutan, orphaned when his mother was caught raiding crops.

"But when you get up in the air you start gasping in horror; there's nothing but palm oil in an area that used to be plush rain forest. Elsewhere, there's burned-out land, which now extends even within the borders of the park."

The demand for palm oil is rising in the U.S. and Europe because it is touted as a "clean" alternative to fuel. Indonesia is the world's top producer of palm oil, and prices have jumped by almost 70 percent in the last year.

But palm oil plantations devastate the forest and create a monoculture on the land, in which orangutans cannot survive. Over the years, Galdikas has fought off loggers, poachers and miners, but nothing has posed as great a threat to her "babies" as palm oil.

There are only an estimated 50,000 to 60,000 orangutans left in the wild, 90 percent of them in Indonesia, said Serge Wich, a scientist at the Great Ape Trust of Iowa. Most live in small, scattered populations that cannot take the onslaught on the forests much longer.

Trees are being cut at a rate of 300 football fields every hour. And massive land-clearing fires have turned the country into one of the top emitters of carbon.

Tanjung Puting, which has 1,600 square miles, clings precariously to the southern tip of Borneo island. Its 6,000 orangutans — one of the two largest populations on the planet, together with the nearby Sebangau National Park — are less vulnerable to diseases and fires.

That has allowed them, to a degree, to live and evolve as they have for millions of years.

"I am not an alarmist," says Galdikas, speaking calmly but deliberately, her brow slightly furrowed. "But I would say, if nothing is done, orangutan populations outside of national parks have less than 10 years left."

Even Tanjung Puting is not safe, in part because of a border dispute between the central government, which argues in favor of a 1996 map, and provincial officials, who are pushing for a much smaller 1977 map. If local officials win, the park could be slashed by up to 25 percent.

Galdikas, of Lithuanian descent, was an anthropology student at the University of California in Los Angeles when she approached Leakey, a visiting lecturer, in 1969. She follows on the heels of Goodall, who today devotes virtually all of her time to advocacy for chimps, and Fossey, who was brutally murdered in her Rwandan hut in 1985.

Two and a half years later, she and her then husband, Rod Brindamour, arrived in Tanjung Puting and settled into a primitive thatch hut in the heart of one of the most biodiverse regions on the planet, with millions of plant and animal species.

Twice featured on the cover of National Geographic Magazine, she wrote an autobiography, "Reflections of Eden," describing how she fell in love with the sound of cicadas, and marveled at the sudden shifts of light that in an instant transformed drab greens and browns into translucent shades of emerald.

Her first challenge was simply finding the well-camouflaged orangutans in 100-foot-high trees. But eventually she was able to track them, sometimes for several weeks at a time.

She discovered that female orangutans give birth when they are around 15 and then only once every eight or nine years, making them especially vulnerable to extinction. They also have one of the most intense maternal-offspring relationships of all mammals, remaining inseparable for the first seven or eight years.

While orangutans are at first very gregarious, as adults they live largely solitary lives, foraging for fruit or sleeping. Orangutan" means "man of the forest."

One of her main projects today is her rehabilitation center in a village outside Tanjung Puting, overflowing with more than 300 animals orphaned when their mothers were killed by palm oil plantation workers.

With forests disappearing, the red apes raid crops, grabbing freshly planted shoots from the fields.

"Many come in very badly wounded, suffering from malnutrition, psychological and emotional and even physical trauma," says Galdikas, as she watches members of her staff prepare six young orangutans for release one overcast Saturday afternoon.

It is a three-hour journey along bumpy roads to the release site. By the time they arrive, it is raining and the last gray light is feebly pushing its way through the deep canopy of trees.

After years of being cared for, fed and taught the ways of the woods, the young orangutans scramble nimbly to the tops of trees. Branches snap as they make their nests for the night.

"It is getting harder and harder to find good, safe forest in which to free them," says Galdikas, who today spends half her time in Indonesia and most of the rest teaching at Simon Fraser University in British Columbia.

Forestry Minister Malem Kaban says the government is committed to protecting Indonesia's dense, primary forests and that no permit should be granted within a half-mile of a national park. Even so, one palm oil company has started clearing trees within Tanjung Puting's northern perimeter, leaving a wasteland of churned-up peat and charred trunks. Four others are seeking concessions along its eastern edge.

Derom Bangun, executive chairman of the Indonesian Palm Oil Association, says while his 300 members have vowed to stay clear of national parks, others have been known to operate within areas that should be off-limits. Sometimes it is not their fault, he notes, pointing to the need for better coordination between central and local government on border issues.

Galdikas, a passionate field researcher, says one of her great regrets is that she does not share Goodall's skills in raising awareness and funds for the great apes. But she is happy Tanjung Puting has over the years grown into a popular tourist destination. She says there's no better advertisement for conservation than being in a rain forest.

Some visitors are even lucky enough to come face to face with an orangutan on a slippery jungle trail.

"As he passes you, you nod and he nods back to you and continues on his way," she says, adding that looking in the eyes of a great ape, it instantly becomes clear that there is no separation between humans and nature.

"If they go extinct, we will have one less kin to call our own in this world," says Galdikas, who is also president of the Los Angeles-based Orangutan Foundation International. "And do we really want to be alone on this planet?"

In addition, much palm oil is produced under slave labor like conditions, forces traditional people out of their homes and cultivated in a environmentally unstable fashion. What does this mean for us vegans? Check out the Vegans of Color blog entry about Earth Balance, a popular substitute for animal-based-butter.

Honoring Your Menses

This was sent to me via the Sistah Vegan Project

Here are some EASY ways to start:

1. Self-awareness is the first step toward HONORING our blood. We must explore our beliefs, views and feelings about menstruation. How do you feel about your blood? Explore where your beliefs came from and why do you feel or believe what you do. Are your views positive, neutral, negative? Do you need to release some beliefs?

2. Next we have to learn our cycles (whether we have a 25, 28 or 31 day cycle). It is important to know approximately know when you should expect your menses. Mark the first day of your bleeding on a calendar with a distinct mark (maybe use a red mark to mark the day). Noting the day allows us to calculate our ovulation, the following menstruation day, and schedule activities according to our physical and emotional state. During menstruation we have less physical energy but heightened intuition but if we are running around DOING instead of just BEING we will likely miss the enlightenment. I don't plan big activities during my menses. I consciously pull back from the world.

3. Absorption matters! Every woman might be ready for the menstrual cup also known as the Diva cup, but we can easily switch to chemical free pads or tampons (I'm not a advocate of tampons but I know that change is a process). Cloth pads are the bomb, we get to collect the blood thru soaking the pads, we save money and support the planet thru reducing our use of disposable products. Going GREEN ain't really optional sistahs, we gotta get better at taking care of the mother (earth) that takes care of us.

4. Tell your Menarche story - When did you get your period? Who was there? Where were you? How did you feel? Let's tell the stories of our first menses. Call up a homegirl or find a young sistah and share your story (No matter what the story is). As we tell our menarche stories we bring validity back to menstruation, we both normalize and
honor our blood and womanhood!

5. Rest & Solitude. We must make rest and solitude a priority during our menses. Our energy level is at its lowest during this time. Rest feels good. As we better learn our cycles we can schedule rest more strategically and not over schedule ten million things the week we are bleeding. Time alone allows to hear our spirits, minds, and
bodies. Whether we are the mother of five, single or a wife we have to make solitude a part of life. Even if its just a hour to two.

Honoring our BLOOD is a process but everything begins with one step... Happy Bleeding!

Want to organize for the New Year?

Here are two articles for organizing your closet and making sure your closet keeps you healthy...

7 Ways to Organize Your Closet, the Eco-Way (hint: it's doesn't involve buying stuff, because consumerism is anti-"green"!)

Healthy Green Closet

Condoms Behind the Counter - But Only in Black Neighborhoods

The NAACP and partner organizations are taking on drugstore chain CVS for consistently providing less service and quality to customers in African American neighborhoods. Among the ways CVS discriminates against its African American customers? Keeping condoms locked up in predominantly black neighborhoods, but not predominantly white neighborhoods.

Keeping condoms behind the counter or otherwise locked up creates a barrier to access and unnecessarily draws attention to the person purchasing condoms - which may inhibit them from making the purchase. In cities across the United States African Americans continue to become infected with HIV at rates vastly higher than those among white people. Our country cannot afford for CVS's policies to keep anyone from getting the condoms they need.

Check out the Cure CVS Now website for information and how you can take action.

Bad Medicine: AMA Seeks To Outlaw Home Births

See the original blog and comments at this link.

Bad Medicine: AMA Seeks To Outlaw Home Births
Amie Newman on June 16, 2008

In an unmistakably insecure and aggressive move, the American Medical Association (AMA) adopted a resolution at its annual meeting last weekend to introduce legislation outlawing home birth - according to The Big Push for Midwives.

According to the hard-working women of The Big Push for Midwives campaign, faced with the sisyphean task of convincing the American mainstream medical establishment that midwifery is a viable option for birthing women:

"It's unclear what penalties the AMA will seek to impose on women who choose to give birth at home, either for religious, cultural or financial reasons-or just because they didn't make it to the hospital in time," said Susan Jenkins, Legal Counsel for The Big Push for Midwives 2008 campaign. "What we do know, however, is that any state that enacts such a law will immediately find itself in court, since a law dictating where a woman must give birth would be a clear violation of fundamental rights to privacy and other freedoms currently protected by the U.S. Constitution."

In other words, advocating for legislation of this kind has the eery ring of familiarity. Legislative attempts at "criminalizing motherhood" have at their core coercive control over pregnancy and childbirth. Regina McKnight was recently released from jail after a judge overturned her homicide conviction for giving birth to a stillborn baby.

Likewise, Colorado's ballot initiative in support of a "personhood amendment" would have untold consequences for pregnant women who accidentally or otherwise miscarry a pregnancy. If a fertilized egg is conferred "personhood" status why would a miscarriage not be investigated as potential murder?

The legal issues surrounding "fundamental rights to privacy" also, of course, reverberate throughout the discussions around Roe v. Wade and a woman's right to have an abortion in this country. Those who fight rigorously to strip away womens' legal right to an abortion somehow seem to skirt the issue of what might happen to a woman if she does choose to access an illegal abortion.

What the AMA's resolution and these other kinds of potential and actual legislation do is to open the door to penalizing motherhood, in effect. Because most of these legislative attempts do not directly address the issue, they leave the door dangerously open to criminalizing women for making the decisions they feel are best for themselves, their fetuses and their families.

Proposing this kind of legislation would also force women to birth in government-approved settings, a scenario that seems almost unbelievable. According to the Big Push for Midwives:


Until the AMA proposed ‘Resolution 205 on Home Deliveries,' no state had considered legislation forcing women to deliver their babies in the hospital or limiting the choice of birth setting. Instead, states have regulated the types of midwives that may legally provide care. Currently, 22 states already license and regulate CPMs, who specialize in out-of-hospital maternity care and have received extensive training to qualify as experts in the types of risk assessment and preventive care necessary for safe and high-quality care for women who choose give birth at home. Certified Nurse Midwives (CNMs), who are trained primarily as hospital-based providers, are licensed in all 50 states and the District of Columbia.


The resolution did not offer any science-based information for the AMA's anti-midwife or anti-home birth position.

Steff Hedenkamp, Communications Coordinator for The Big Push for Midwives says, "Maternity care is a multi-billion dollar industry in the United States. So it's no surprise to see the AMA join the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists in its ongoing fight to corner the market and ensure that the only midwives able to practice legally are hospital-based midwives forced to practice under physician control. I will say, though, that I'm shocked to learn that the AMA is taking this turf battle to the next level by setting the stage for outlawing home birth itself-a direct attack on those families who choose home birth, who could be subject to criminal prosecution if the AMA has its way."

If you'd like to help The Big Push for Midwives fight this please visit their web site and push back against attempts to "deny American families access to safe and legal midwifery care."

Update, 2:45pm, EDT: Wanted - Ricki Lake! Apparently the AMA has issued Resolution 205 partially in response to none other than Ricki Lake and her campaign to promote midwifery and natural childbirth as a safe option for healthy women via her documentary, The Business of Being Born. Safe Birth Ohio notes that, in Britain, mainstream medical associations like the Royal College of Gynecologists have come to very different conclusions about the safety of home birth as an option for healthy, laboring women. And, yet, the AMA has swung the pendulum in the opposite direction deciding homebirth should be outlawed and that Ricki Lake is dangerous to mamas everywhere.

Female Anatomy 101: The Clit

On An Inconvenient Truth.

"If everybody in the Unites States did everything that Al Gore... suggested in that movie [An Inconvenient Truth -ed.], then that would reduce emissions by about 21%. The consensus these days is that for further disaster to be averted, emissions need to be reduced by 80%"- Derrick Jensen

Immigrant Women, Seeking Status Adjustment, Face Forced Vaccination

From RH Reality Check by Jessica Gonzalez-Rojas and Emily Alexander.

This July, the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) announced new requirements, including five new vaccinations for individuals seeking adjustment of immigration status. One of these vaccinations is Gardasil, the human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine. Gardasil, manufactured by Merck, is the only HPV vaccine in the U.S.--also the most expensive vaccine on the market and the only vaccine to be approved for use in only one sex. The CDC's Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) is the only federal body that makes recommendations about immunizations; the committee's recommendations serve as the template that USCIS uses to determine immunization requirements for immigration procedures. These new requirements put increased barriers and additional burdens on women's access to adjustment of immigration status and applications for visas to enter the U.S. and stoke the already reverberating anxieties among communities of color about the HPV vaccine.

Most immigration applicants are currently required to undergo a medical exam by a certified "civil surgeon." These civil surgeons complete an I-693 medical examination and vaccination record. The new regulations that require the HPV vaccine apply to female applicants between the ages of 11 to 26. This is the only sex-specific vaccination requirement, putting particular burden on immigrant women applying for a visa or adjustment of status, further marginalizing a group that already has reduced access to health information and services that are affordable, accessible and culturally and linguistically competent.

According to the Census, there are approximately 17.5 million immigrant women in the United States today, 3 million of whom are undocumented, and 16 percent that live in poverty. These women encounter obstacles to employment and health access; they also face violence and discrimination. Immigrant rights and reproductive justice are intrinsically linked because the reproductive health of immigrant women is profoundly affected by immigration policy. For women seeking adjustment of status, the USCIS' additional vaccine requirements create tremendous barriers to one of the many steps towards a pathway to citizenship.

While women of color, many who are immigrants, face disproportionate rates of cervical cancer in the U.S. (Latina women get cervical cancer at twice the rate of white women; and Vietnamese women get cervical cancer at five-times the rate of white women), efforts should be made to increase access and education about HPV and the vaccine, rather than creating further impediments to the already onerous immigration process. The HPV vaccine is out of reach for many women with its high price tag: at a minimum, it costs $360 for the three shot regimen. Publicly-funded access to the HPV vaccine varies state-to-state, although all low-income adolescents between the ages of 9 through 19 who are either uninsured, Medicaid-eligible, American Indian, or Alaska Native, have access to the vaccine through the federal Vaccines for Children (VFC) program. Immigrant women over the age of 19 may have greater challenges in obtaining the vaccine. According to the Kaiser Commission on Medicaid and Uninsured and the National Council of La Raza (NCLR), between 45% and 51% of immigrants lack health coverage in the US. The lack of health insurance, coupled with the high cost of the vaccine, limits access to the vaccine for low-income immigrant women. In addition, for immigration visa applicants abroad, the global availability and accessibility of the vaccine is questionable.

States also use the CDC's Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices recommendations when developing their own vaccine requirements for school entry. Calls for state school mandate bills for this vaccine seem to have calmed down, allowing advocates the opportunity to provide much-needed education and advocacy around HPV and cervical cancer prevention. Now this new requirement threatens that critical work.

Instead of mandating vaccines for immigrant women's bodies, the U.S. government should increase access to health information and services that are unbiased, age-appropriate, culturally-competent and non-coercive. Mandating a vaccine that specifically targets young non-citizen women is both sexist and xenophobic. It will only add to the current anxieties among many communities of color about the vaccine and the government's interest in vaccinating a particular community, in this case, immigrant women.

D.I.Y (Do It Yourself) Cleaners... and why?

On being an energy-efficient renter

From Grist:

Renting is a blessing and a curse: little control, and little responsibility. You don't get to make long-term, expensive investments, but you can certainly undergo behavior modifications to reduce your energy bills. I've offered the generally recommended steps over the years, and I'm happy to collect them all here. We might as well go room by room.

In the KITCHEN, our main hope for energy savings is in reducing hot water use in the sink and dishwasher. Install low-flow attachments on the sink -- and, in fact, on all the faucets in your apartment. If you have a dishwasher that's not a dinosaur, use it; the newer models are more efficient than cleaning dishes by hand. Run it only when full, and don't use the "heated dry" setting. Use a dish tub if you do have to lave the old-fashioned way. Keep the fridge and freezer relatively full and at 36 to 38 degrees Fahrenheit for the main compartment and between 0 and 5 degrees for the freezer. Turns out, cleaning the coils doesn't make a big difference in fridge energy use. Phew. (As an aside, replacing an old refrigerator with an Energy Star model is good, so if you can persuade your landlord ...) Microwaves and plug-in kettles are more efficient than using the stovetop and oven.

Over in the bathroom, we can continue our crusade to get in less hot water. We've already installed a flow restrictor on the faucet, and now we can put a low-flow head on the shower. Take short showers and fewer baths if you can bear it (I personally find bath restriction an onerous duty).

In the bedroom, a major help is to have an ample comforter, so the thermostat can be turned down as far as possible at night. The overall goal, of course, is to keep the thermostat as low as you can when it's cold outside, and as high and un-air conditioned as you can when it's warm. If you or the landlord can pony up the dollars for a programmable thermostat, it may be worth it. They're fairly cheap, and they always remember to lower the heat while we're at work -- something we ourselves might forget. It takes less energy to reheat or re-cool the apartment when you get home than it takes to keep it toasty or cool while you're away.

Throughout your dwelling, replace incandescent bulbs with compact fluorescents, and turn off lights when you leave a room. Turn off your computer if you're not going to use it for an hour. Unplug electronic devices that come with LED lights or standby functions: These draw small amounts of power that add up over time. The same goes for "wall warts" such as cell phones and iPod chargers -- even when they're not charging anything, they're drawing phantom energy. Power strips are a handy way to turn off a whole bunch of the suckers at once.

There is also a lot you can do with your windows, which can be huge panes in the glass (sorry). Windows, seriously, are a major source of excess heat loss and heat gain, but here I'll refer you to a previous column that examines the problem in detail. Suffice it to say that key items for window efficiency include curtains, caulk, and glazing. As to doors, if your apartment has one leading to the outside, you might consider putting weather-stripping around the jamb.

What else? Laundry should be washed in cold water and hung dry when possible. If you're doing all these things already and have rooms and quandaries I haven't imagined, then I have failed you today. Write back and let me know, and I'll see if I can dig a little deeper.

Guaranteedly,
Umbra

Follow-up to "Air Freshners: Not so good for you"

Indoor Air Clean-Up

There's perhaps no month as filled with ritual as October. As we make our annual journey across the weeks between summer and winter, there are gardens to put to bed, leaves to leap in, pumpkins to carve, and homes to ready for the coming cold.

For many of us that means sealing windows, adding weatherstripping to doors, and adopting other strategies that tighten our dwellings to better hold their precious warmth. That's a good thing where energy conservation is concerned, but a well-sealed home traps more than heat ― it can trap odors, stale air, and other olfactory nuisances, too.

To mask the smelliness, we often turn to air fresheners. From aerosols and plug-in units to potpourris and scented candles, fragrance products are a $9 billion a year industry. Yet researchers sniffing out the truth about them have found that such products frequently contain more than a pleasant scent.

According to the Children's Health Environmental Coalition, the fragrance products industry relies on over 3,000 different chemical compounds to create its olfactory wonders. These include flammable propellants like butane and propane; terpenes, xylene, benzene, and other volatile organic compounds; petroleum distillates like naphthalene; and chemicals like phenol, cresol, and paradichlorobenzene. Recently, a Canadian Broadcasting Corporation investigation of air fresheners found that nearly a third of the samples tested contained phthalates.

These and other ingredients are combined in air freshener formulas to create products intentionally designed to fill our homes with invisible airborne fumes that linger in the air where they can be repeatedly inhaled. And manufacturers aren't required to tell us exactly what's in the air fresheners we buy. Instead, most hide their ingredients behind generic label terms like "fragrance" and "scent agent." When we use these products, we have no way of knowing what we're really breathing, and in winter's sealed-up homes, our exposure to them can be nearly constant.

For a safer choice, stick to natural air freshening strategies. Here's a list of our favorite ways to deodorize your domicile:

* First, track down and eliminate the sources of any persistent bad odors in your home. Since many foul smells are the result of molds or microbial action, spraying or scrubbing trouble spots like trash cans and compost collectors with undiluted 3% solution of hydrogen peroxide will often remove the foul smells. Vinegar is another useful natural antifungal and antibacterial agent.

* Use natural mineral borax and/or baking soda to deodorize surfaces and other places in your home. Because baking soda removes acid odors and vinegar takes care of alkaline smells, a combination of the two is often all you'll need to deodorize as you clean. Lemon juice is another great deodorizer.

* Open windows and doors for a few moments now and then during winter to replace stale indoor air with a fresh supply from outside.

* If odors persist, make your own air freshening spray by combining 5-10 drops of an essential oil like lavender, lemon, peppermint, bergamot, balsam, eucalyptus, tea tree, or sweet orange in a spray bottle with two cups of water.

* To scent indoor air, place a drop of your favorite essential oil on a light bulb prior to turning it on or add a dozen drops to a bowl of water placed on a radiator. Fragrant dried herbs, cinnamon sticks, or cloves boiled in a pot of water will also release a fresh smell.

* Place a couple of drops of essential oil on your vacuum cleaner's exhaust filter to freshen exiting air. A few drops of lemon juice on your vacuum cleaner bag will do the same trick.

* If you burn candles to scent air make sure yours are made natural waxes like soy rather than petroleum-based paraffin wax. Choose candles with lead-free wicks and naturally-derived scents. And use them sparingly ― natural candles may be safer but they're still filling your air with small amounts of combustion byproducts.

* Problem situations can sometimes be helped by an air purifier that contains an activated charcoal filter. Don't use devices that generate ozone, which is a hazardous pollutant.

Chicago Abortion Fund's August Call-In Show

Here's a taste, part 1 of 3. This month, Shay is joined by Ronnie from F.R.I.D.A- Feminist Response In Disability Activism.

Masturbation is fun!

Just thought I'd point that out.



From Take Care Down There, a project of Planned Parenthood Columbia Willamette. There's more videos on their page- I love the awkward guy! It's almost funny, almost not. I can't decide.

What organic fruits and veggies should you buy?

Who can afford to buy 100% organic? An unfortunate truth is, what's healthy is kept out of the range of poor and middle class folk. Luckily, Food News has created a list of the top 12 most pesticide-contaminated fruits and veggies. If you can afford to buy these organic, you are significantly lowering your health risks, farm workers' health risks and, hopefully, the planet's!

THE DIRTY DOZEN

Peaches
Apples
Sweet Bell Peppers
Celery
Nectarines
Strawberries
Cherries
Lettuce
Grapes - Imported
Pears
Spinach
Potatoes

An EWG simulation of thousands of consumers eating high and low pesticide diets shows that people can lower their pesticide exposure by almost 90 percent by avoiding the top twelve most contaminated fruits and vegetables and eating the least contaminated instead. Eating the 12 most contaminated fruits and vegetables will expose a person to about 14 pesticides per day, on average. Eating the 12 least contaminated will expose a person to less than 2 pesticides per day. Less dramatic comparisons will produce less dramatic reductions, but without doubt using the Guide provides people with a way to make choices that lower pesticide exposure in the diet.


*Why Should You Care About Pesticides?

There is growing consensus in the scientific community that small doses of pesticides and other chemicals can adversely affect people, especially during vulnerable periods of fetal development and childhood when exposures can have long lasting effects. Because the toxic effects of pesticides are worrisome, not well understood, or in some cases completely unstudied, shoppers are wise to minimize exposure to pesticides whenever possible.


*Will Washing and Peeling Help?

Nearly all of the data used to create these lists already considers how people typically wash and prepare produce (for example, apples are washed before testing, bananas are peeled). While washing and rinsing fresh produce may reduce levels of some pesticides, it does not eliminate them. Peeling also reduces exposures, but valuable nutrients often go down the drain with the peel. The best option is to eat a varied diet, wash all produce, and choose organic when possible to reduce exposure to potentially harmful chemicals.