Practice Paper: Promoting Ecological Sustainability within the Food System

A new Practice Paper from the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetic is available and the topic is Promoting Ecological Sustainability within the Food System. I'm happy to see the final paper since I helped review it months ago as a member of the Hunger and Environmental Nutrition Dietetic Practice Group. The final paper was authored by my colleague Ramona Robinson-O’Brien and Bonnie L. Gerald.

I really like this call to action:

It is important to continually evaluate current food system practices and promote practices that support and sustain natural resources and the environment. Food system sustainability is dependent, in part, upon the protection and conservation of soil, water, energy, and the preservation of biodiversity. Promoting food system sustainability can be an admirable goal among RDs and DTRs. 

I was also intrigued by this address to decreased pesticide usage and possible suggestion to support organic agriculture:

The use of pesticides in agriculture may have a negative impact on wildlife and the wider environment (water, soil, air) if leaching, runoff, or spray drift occurs. In an effort to mitigate adverse environmental exposures, consideration should be given to alternative cropping systems less dependent on pesticides, the development of pesticides with improved safety profiles and formulations, and appropriate use of spraying equipment. 

There is also a fantastic section on consumer options, including growing interest is local food, “Know Your Farmer, Know Your Food,” farm to institution work, and innovations to address food access including SNAP benefits at farmers markets, community gardens, and utilization of cooperative extension. 

Finally, I was also super excited to see a shout out to some fantastic resources that some fellow HEN DPG members developed:

Included in the resource figure (Figure 1) is a link to the document “Healthy Land, Healthy People: Building a Better Understanding of Sustainable Food Systems for Food and Nutrition Professionals,” which provides wide-ranging recommendations for RDs and DTRs to incorporate professional practices in support of ecological sustainability in the food system. RDs and DTRs are encouraged to utilize this valuable tool to identify practical examples within a variety of practice areas. Wilkins and colleagues contend that the economic, ecological, and social sustainability of the food system matter as much as the nutritional value of its products and encourage RDs and DTRs to practice “civic dietetics” by integrating food system awareness into their work.

Pesticide Guide

The Environmental Working Group has release a new guide to 12 foods that contain the most and least pesticides. If you are going to buy organic, these are the ones. From there website:

What's the Difference?

An EWG simulation of thousands of consumers eating high and low pesticide diets shows that people can lower their pesticide exposure by almost 80 percent by avoiding the top twelve most contaminated fruits and vegetables and eating the least contaminated instead. Eating the 12 most contaminated fruits and vegetables will expose a person to about 10 pesticides per day, on average. Eating the 15 least contaminated will expose a person to less than 2 pesticides per day. Less dramatic comparisons will produce less dramatic reductions, but without doubt using the Guide provides people with a way to make choices that lower pesticide exposure in the diet.

Most Contaminated: THE DIRTY DOZEN

Consistent with two previous EWG investigations, fruits topped the list of the consistently most contaminated fruits and vegetables, with seven of the 12 most contaminated foods. The seven were peaches leading the list, then apples, nectarines and strawberries, cherries, and imported grapes, and pears. Among these seven fruits:

• Nectarines had the highest percentage of samples test positive for pesticides (97.3 percent), followed by peaches (96.7 percent) and apples (94.1 percent).
• Peaches had the highest likelihood of multiple pesticides on a single sample - 87.0 percent had two or more pesticide residues — followed by nectarines (85.3 percent) and apples (82.3 percent).
• Peaches and apples had the most pesticides detected on a single sample, with nine pesticides on a single sample, followed by strawberries and imported grapes where eight pesticides were found on a single sample of each fruit.
• Peaches had the most pesticides overall, with some combination of up to 53 pesticides found on the samples tested, followed by apples with 50 pesticides and strawberries with 38.

Sweet bell peppers, celery, kale, lettuce, and carrots are the vegetables most likely to expose consumers to pesticides. Among these five vegetables:

• Celery had the highest of percentage of samples test positive for pesticides (94.1 percent), followed by sweet bell peppers (81.5 percent) and carrots (82.3 percent).
• Celery also had the highest likelihood of multiple pesticides on a single vegetable (79.8 percent of samples), followed by sweet bell peppers (62.2 percent) and kale (53.1 percent).
• Sweet bell peppers had the most pesticides detected on a single sample (11 found on one sample), followed by kale (10 found on one sample), then lettuce and celery (both with nine).
• Sweet bell peppers were the vegetable with the most pesticides overall, with 64, followed by lettuce with 57 and carrots with 40.