• Natural carcinogens are present in mushrooms, parsley, basil, celery, cola, coffee, wine, beer, mustard, peanut butter, bread and lima beans, just to name a few.
• The risk of developing cancer from consuming all major pesticides (through minute residues in food) in a typical diet is thousands of times less than the risk associated with natural carcinogens in beer, wine and cola.
• In 1950, chemicals could be detected at the level of one part per million (equivalent to one minute in two years). Today, we can measure many chemicals at the one part per trillion level...and our instrumentation technology continues to advance.
• “[Pesticides] don’t show up in dangerous levels. No one has yet been sick or killed by any pesticide that’s been found on a food.”-Dr. C. Everett Koop, Former U.S. Surgeon General
• In 1960, one farmer fed 25 people. Today, one farmer feeds 129.
• World population is expected to peak at 8.5 billion people by the year 2035–up from the current 5.9 billion today.
• American families enjoy the cheapest, most abundant food supply in the world. We spend about 10.9 percent of our total income on food.
• Only 7 percent of the earth’s surface is currently available for agricultural production.
• Without pesticides and fertilizers, U.S. consumers would spend 30 to 40 percent of their income on food instead of the current 10.9 percent, which is the lowest expenditure in the world.
• The average life expectancy in the U.S. today is 76.1 years, compared with 70 years in 1960, 60 years in 1930 and 47 years in 1900.
• Without pesticides and fertilizers, U.S. farm exports would fall to zero. Our balance of trade would drop by billions of dollars, and millions of people around the world would starve.
• “The whole world is chock full of carcinogens. A beer, with its 700 parts per billion of formaldehyde and 5 parts per hundred of alcohol is 1,000 times more hazardous than anything in the water.”-Dr. Bruce Arnes, University of California, Berkeley
• The agriculture industry invests annually and works continuously to research, develop and test new pesticides and fertilizers that are more effective but have less impact on the environment.
• According to the American Council on Science and Health, human exposure to chemicals consists overwhelmingly of exposure to chemicals of natural, not man-made, origin.
• A cup of coffee is estimated to contain more than 2,000 natural chemical components, few of which have been adequately studied and many of which have never even been identified, according to the American Council on Science and Health.
• More than 1.1 billion people in the world suffer from malnutrition. That’s about one out of every five.
• “At the moment, there is just no evidence that the food supply represents a hazard that would require any change in the regulatory programs currently administered by federal agencies and the states.”-Dr. Sanford A. Miller, former director of the Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition
• Consumers spent an average of $2,328 per person for food in 1992.
• In 1950, American farmers produced 50 bushels of corn per acre. Today, American farmers produce about 127.1 bushels per acre.
• The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and state regulatory agencies enforce one of the most stringent regulatory systems in the world to ensure the safety of our produce.
Reprint permission given by AgAir Update, P.O. Box 850, Perry, GA 31069 - an international agricultural aviation publication.
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