Research Institute of Organic Agriculture (FiBL), Ackerstrasse 113, 5070 Frick, Switzerland.
Environ Pollut. 2022 Nov 15;313:120116. doi: 10.1016/j.envpol.2022.120116. Epub 2022 Sep 7.
The use of synthetic pesticides is not allowed in organic production, but traces of synthetic pesticides are regularly detected in organic food. To safeguard the integrity of organic production, organic certifiers are obliged to investigate the causes for pesticide residues on organic food, entailing high costs to the organic sector. Such residues can have various origins, including both fraud and unintentional contamination from the environment. Because the knowledge about contamination from environmental sources is scattered, this review provides an overview of pathways for unintentional and technically unavoidable contamination of organic food with synthetic pesticides in Europe. It shows that synthetic pesticides are widely present in all environmental compartments. They originate from applications in the region, in distant areas or from historical use. Transition into the food chain has been demonstrated by various studies. However, large uncertainties remain regarding the true pesticide contamination of the environment, their dynamics and the contamination risks for the food chain. Organic operators can take certain measures to reduce the risks of pesticide contamination of their products, but a certain extent of pesticide contamination is technically unavoidable. The present paper indicates that (i) a potential risk for pesticide residues exists on all organic crops and thus organic operators cannot meet a 'zero-tolerance' approach regarding pesticide residues at the moment. (ii) Applying a residue concentration threshold to distinguish between cases of fraud and unavoidable contamination for all pesticides is not adequate given the variability of contamination. More reliable answers can be obtained with a case-by-case investigation, where evidence for all possible origins of pesticide residues is collected and the likelihood of unavoidable contamination and fraud are estimated. Ultimately, for organic certification bodies and control authorities it will remain a challenge to determine whether a pesticide residue is due to neglect of production rules or technically unavoidable.
有机生产中不允许使用合成农药，但在有机食品中经常检测到合成农药的痕迹。为了维护有机生产的完整性，有机认证机构有义务调查有机食品中农药残留的原因，这给有机行业带来了很高的成本。这些残留可能有各种来源，包括欺诈和环境的无意污染。由于有关环境来源污染的知识分散，因此本篇综述提供了在欧洲，有机食品中无意和技术上不可避免地被合成农药污染的途径的概述。它表明，合成农药广泛存在于所有环境组份中。它们源自该地区、遥远地区或历史用途的应用。已经通过各种研究证明了它们向食物链的转移。然而，对于环境中真正的农药污染、其动态以及对食物链的污染风险，仍然存在很大的不确定性。有机经营者可以采取某些措施来降低其产品受到农药污染的风险，但在技术上，一定程度的农药污染是不可避免的。本文指出：（i）所有有机作物都存在农药残留的潜在风险，因此有机经营者目前无法实现对农药残留的“零容忍”。（ii）考虑到污染的可变性，应用残留浓度阈值来区分所有农药的欺诈和不可避免污染的情况是不充分的。通过逐个案例进行调查，可以获得更可靠的答案，在这种调查中，收集了所有可能的农药残留来源的证据，并估计了不可避免的污染和欺诈的可能性。最终，对于有机认证机构和控制当局来说，确定农药残留是由于生产规则的疏忽还是技术上不可避免，仍然是一个挑战。
