CVUA: residue of pesticides on fresh vegetables in 2013

During 2013 CVUA Stuttgart took 892 samples from fresh vegetables conventionally grown to test for the presence of more than 650 different pesticide residues. 755 of these samples (84,6%) contained residue from 199 different active substances (2012: 219 active substances, 2011: 191 active substances, 2010: 187 active substances, 2009: 171 active substances). 39 vegetable samples (4.4%) were above the legal limit for pesticide residue. However, this figure was lower than the previous year, (2012: 57 samples - 6.4%, 2011: 53 samples - 7.0%).

Research results showed that the percentage of samples exceeding the maximum legal limit was dependant on the country of origin. Just 2.1% of the German samples contained more residue than permitted. The average percentage of samples from other EU countries was 2.3%, and the percentage of samples from third world countries was around 12.8%.

In 2013, 71% of the tested vegetables samples contained different pesticide residue. On average 3.8 different active substances were found per sample.