Pesticides
Business is booming for the pesticide industry in both the U.S. and China, and more and more pesticides are ending up in our tea. On July 24, 2013, the EPA allowed a 3000% increase in the use of pesticides on food crops. The EPA has documented a 26 percent increase in herbicide use since 2001.
Bill Freese, science policy analyst at the Center for Food Safety says "it's ironic that supposedly 'cutting-edge' biotechnology is taking American agriculture a half-century and more backwards into a more toxic past."
Greenpeace did a study of nine tea companies in China and published the results in their magazine, Greenpeace East Asia, in April 2012. They discovered that at least 12 of the 18 samples they tested contained at least one pesticide banned for use on tea. One of the pesticides present, endosulfan, has been banned globally under the Stockholm Convention due to its toxic properties. All 18 samples contained at least three pesticides. One sample had 17 different kinds of pesticides. Fourteen samples contained the kind of pesticides that may affect fertility, harm an unborn child or cause inheritable genetic damage. Eleven of the tea samples were found to contain pesticides that are banned for use on tea leaves by China's Ministry of Agriculture.
Many American teas don't necessarily do much better in their offering of a toxic brew. Foodbabe provides a chart on the test results of the ingredients in commercial and popular teas. This chart is a tea drinker's guide for both avoiding harmful substances in tea and for patronizing the tea companies that care about our health.
"Natural" Additives
What the actual ingredients are in "natural flavors" is usually proprietary information, so it can be very difficult if not impossible to discover what dangers may lurk under this label. Natural only means that the ingredient started out in nature. Arsenic and hydrochloric acid are two examples. The Code of Federal Regulations defines a "natural flavor" as a substance which is extracted from plant or animal matter. Natural flavor can legally contain natural occurring "glutamate" bi-products like MSG, an excitotoxin which can cause cell damage. By food industry definition, all MSG is naturally occurring.
Food Identity Theft presents a short list of some of the harmful ingredients hiding under the "natural" label." A few of the ingredients in teas which may simply be listed on the box as "natural flavorings" can include:
Castoreum, which is an extraction of the dried glands and secretions from a beaver's anus and is used in vanilla and raspberry flavorings.
MSG, a neurotoxin which can interfere with the functions of the nervous system. This toxic substance can also legally hide under the label of "natural" because although the FDA requires ingredients such as "monosodium glutamate," and "hydrolyzed" proteins to be disclosed on the food label, there are over 40 other MSG-containing ingredients which do not require a label.
There are also ingredients listed under natural flavors which serve as taste-bud-deceptors. These ingredients attach to the taste-bud-receptor by not allowing the taste sensation to be perceived, thereby effectively blocking undesirable taste components. These taste-bud-deceptors are used in food, beverages, and supplements.
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