ORANGE JUICE CHEMICALS IN COSTCO MUSHROOMS

Back in January this year, orange juice safety hit the news in the U.S. and some other countries as well. The issue was a chemical called carbendazim - a fungicide used to control plant diseases that had been used on orange trees in Brazil, where the frozen orange juice came from (see earlier posts).

Carbendazim is approved for use in some countries but not the U.S.. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) does not allow even low levels of carbendazim in U.S. food. Now this same unhealthy chemical - plus a couple of others (fluoranthene and pyrene) has been found in shittake mushrooms.

L.A. Link of Cerritos, California is recalling 6 0z plastic jars of Shiitake-Ya brand Gourmet Shiitake Slices with a “SELL BY date” of 04/16/2013. They were sold at COSTCO - that huge grocery store, in California, Oregon and Washington.

If you bought them, throw them out or take them back and get a refund. But if you ate them, don't panick - one meal containing low doses of these chemicals will not kill you.

To your good health,
TSF

IS OUR ORANGE JUICE TOXIC?

I keep telling my husband that juice isn't nearly as healthy as he thinks it is. He keeps religiously drinking his 2 glasses of processed juice every day, and I eat fresh oranges instead (off the trees I have planted in the garden). Maybe now he will believe me.

And it's not just a nutritional issue. Orange juice has recently hit the food safety headlines. The focus is on a fungicide called carbendazim which is used to fight blossom blight and black spot, a type of mold that grows on orange trees - as well I know. I have problems with this mold every year - not just on my orange trees, but also the lemon, grapefruit and lime trees. Unfortunately, there is also some evidence to show that carbendazim may be linked to increased rates of cancers and infertility - like many pesticides. That is, if you are exposed to it in sufficiently large quantities over a long-enough period of time.

Carbendazim is widely used in Brazil - the world's top exporter of orange juice. In the past few years more of this fungicide is being used on Brazilian orange crops because black spot has become a major problem. Of course, traces of it end up in the juice. What do you expect? No washing of oranges is really good enough.

If you drink U.S. orange juice you are likely to be safe from it because this fungicide has been banned in the U.S. since 2008. In fact, most of U.S. orange juice is made from domestic oranges from Florida. However, brands such as Tropicana, from PepsiCo Inc, and Minute Maid, from Coca-Cola Co., may use a mix of juices sourced from Brazil (which is our top external supplier) and/or Mexico, and the United States. In fact, I found the news early this morning while researching Coca-Cola stock, wondering why it was down quite heavily. That explained it.

So how much of this pesticide in our juice is too much, given that many Americans drink a glass of orange juice every morning? Opinions vary and so do standards among different countries. Surprisingly, the EU allows quite high levels (up to 200 ppb). In the U.S., the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has ramped up testing for carbendazim in imported juices and also quarantined any imported orange juice that's on its way here, until we find out more.(It seems that at least some juice from Canada has been cleared, since levels were found to be very low).

Meantime, the orange juice futures traders are keeping busy with the ups and downs in price (it's a small and volatile market).

To your good health,
TSF