The Horrifying Test Results from School Lunches Make the Clear Case for Organic Food

(Organic food advocates testifying at a recent congressional briefing in Washington, D.C. From l. to r., Kelly Ryerson, founder of Glyphosate Facts; Dr. Michelle Perro, pediatrician and CEO of GMOScience; Zen Honeycutt, founding executive director of Moms Across America; Dr. John Fagan, co-founder and chief scientist at HRI Labs; Mark Doudlah, owner of Doudlah Farms Organics. Photo courtesy of Augusto F. Menezes.)

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If politicians ever had reservations about the importance of making organic food a priority for kids in this country, the congressional briefing that recently took place in Washington, D.C. should have eliminated any doubts.

Alongside several food activists, a national coalition of mothers that educate the public about GMOs, pesticides and health — Moms Across America — presented the results of tests that it conducted on school lunches across the U.S., and the picture it painted was a dreadful one — a food supply full of toxic pesticides, veterinary contraceptives and hormones, antibiotics and harmful heavy metals, not to mention an overall lack of nutrition.

“Americans are being poisoned by industrial agriculture, and our entire food system needs to be transformed,” said Zen Honeycutt, founding executive director of Moms Across America. “Organic food is the clear answer, but this food supply is far from perfect and is being contaminated by heavy metals.”

KEY FINDINGS FROM THE SCHOOL LUNCH TESTS

(Graphic from Moms Across America.)

The advocacy group tested 43 lunch items from 18 public schools across the U.S., and here were some of the key findings:

• 93.4% had detectable levels of the glyphosate weed killer. (Glyphosate has been called a “probable human carcinogen” by the World Health Organization, and it is linked to cancer and many other ailments.)
• The highest levels of glyphosate and AMPA (AMPA is glyphosate’s breakdown and can be even more toxic) were found in pizza and a beef taco with a soft wheat tortilla.
• 28 of the 44 school meal samples contained wheat ingredients, and 100% of the wheat products tested positive for glyphosate.
• 29 different types of pesticides were present in 74% of the school lunches.
• Piperonal butoxide, a developmental toxin that causes birth defects and neurodevelopment disruptions, was in 41% of the samples.
• 100% of the school lunch samples contained heavy metals (such as arsenic, cadmium, lead and mercury), some at levels up to 6,293x higher than the EPA’s maximum levels allowed in drinking water.
• High levels of 4 veterinary drugs and hormones were found in 9 school lunch samples. This includes very high levels of nicarbazin, an anti-parasitic drug for veterinary use and also used as an aviary contraceptive.
• The lab testing showed that most samples were sorely deficient in appropriate amounts of vital minerals, such as sodium, potassium, iron, calcium, phosphorus and magnesium.

ORGANIC IS THE OPTIMAL ANSWER BUT MORE NEEDS TO BE DONE

It goes without saying that schoolchildren should not be consuming foods that have been tainted with these toxic materials, and organic is the only option if we really care about their long-term health.

However, organic is by no means perfect, and watchdog groups are demanding improvement.

“Organic certifications are not requiring batch testing for heavy metals, and that is an enormous problem,” said Zen Honeycutt of Moms Across America. “People assume organic is safe and not contaminated because it has the USDA organic seal, but that is not necessarily the case. The organic industry must get to the source of the problem. Heavy metals can cause permanent damage.”

Jackie Bowen, executive director of the Clean Label Project, has been at the forefront of heavy metal testing for years, as many organic baby food brands have sought out her certification.

“Heavy metals, such as arsenic, cadmium, lead and mercury are naturally occurring, but because of activities such as industrial agriculture, fracking and mining, there are pollution hotspots, and our water and soil have become overly contaminated. Furthermore, the USDA’s National Organic Program has been completely silent on contaminated compost, in which organic crops are often grown. All of this trickles down to what ends up in our food.”

While Congress has been slow to enact federal environmental legislation to reduce this heavy metal contamination, states such as California have taken matters into their own hands. Assembly Bill 899, which goes into effect on January 1, 2024, will require baby food manufacturers to test representative samples of the food they sell for arsenic, cadmium, lead and mercury.

Even with state legislation, Jackie Bowen contends that consumers, on their own, are already having a positive effect on the industry.

“For parents who know about purchasing organic baby food and pre-natal supplements that have been tested for heavy metals, this concern for clean food will not go away once their children have aged out of baby food. These same parents are going to demand that non-baby organic brands deliver an equivalent level of testing, transparency and purity as their children grow older. We have seen that companies who proactively test are winning in the marketplace, and consumers are supporting the brands that are opting into safety.”

“Yet, brands should be aggressively testing for other reasons as well. If they do not lock down a clean supply now, they may be scrambling in five years to do so, and if they cannot find an ample clean supply then, their business could be at real risk. Invariably, this is going to force badly needed change up and down the entire organic supply chain.”

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Several months ago, we wrote about the state of California legally defining “regenerative agriculture” and how the national consequences for organic could be severe.

Today is the first of five public hearings on the matter, and the Regenerative Organic Alliance (ROA) has come out strongly regarding the importance of creating a definition of regenerative agriculture that starts with organic practices. To read more about ROA’s position, please click HERE.

With gratitude, Max Goldberg, Founder