Chemical cocktail? I’m happy to tuck into fruit and veg
THE article ‘Alarming chemical cocktail sprayed on your fruit and veg’ (Mail) is no more than the Soil Association using its own Project Fear to try to bump up the sales of organic produce. All fruit and vegetables contain hundreds of natural chemicals. When extracted and tested on animals, about half induce cancer and/or circulation problems. But eating fruit and vegetables does not cause cancer or other health problems because the amounts of natural chemicals are simply too small to have any adverse health effects. The chemical traces the Soil Association complains about are thousands of times smaller than the natural constituents and thus irrelevant for health.
TONY TREWAVAS FRS, Emeritus professor, Institute of Molecular Plant Sciences, University of Edinburgh. I AM a retired farmer and have to ask if anyone believes British farmers spray chemicals just for the hell of it? Chemicals are expensive, but are necessary to ensure we are able to harvest a crop and feed a growing population. Throughout my farming career, we never needed to use slug pellets as burning got rid of slugs. Now that burning is banned, there is an ongoing problem with slugs. Farmers employ agronomists to enable them to grow food that is safe for the public to eat. Thanks to reliable scientific advice, we have come a long way from 60 years ago when farmers used DDT as an insecticide before it was known to cause cancer.
E. C. P. BROWN, St Neots, Cambs.