EWG is anti-pesticide but blames AFF, CDFA & USDA for saying so

By ACSH Staff — Oct 21, 2010
The Environmental Working Group (EWG) is ensuring that ghosts and goblins are not the only things you ll have to fear this Halloween as they send out another infamous scaremongering email. This time EWG is unhappy that the Alliance for Food and Farming (AFF), a national non-profit organization composed of farmers and farm groups, in conjunction with the California Department of Food and Agriculture (CDFA) and the U.S.

The Environmental Working Group (EWG) is ensuring that ghosts and goblins are not the only things you ll have to fear this Halloween as they send out another infamous scaremongering email. This time EWG is unhappy that the Alliance for Food and Farming (AFF), a national non-profit organization composed of farmers and farm groups, in conjunction with the California Department of Food and Agriculture (CDFA) and the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), has invested $180,000 to launch a campaign to counter claims by activist groups about unsafe levels of pesticides.

Who could one of those activist groups that they re referring to be? You guessed it EWG themselves. Yet apparently EWG doesn t see it that way, since in an email the group states:

If you agree that it s outrageous to use taxpayer dollars to finance attacks on independent food safety watchdog groups like EWG that educate the public about pesticides in food, the USDA needs to hear from you today.

Finally, the USDA and CDFA are working with the AFF to get people to start eating more fruits and vegetables by specifically countering EWG s scare tactics against pesticides, and yet they have the consummate gall to say, Who, us? says ACSH's Dr. Gilbert Ross.

They ve been scaring people about eating fruits and vegetables through warnings they deliver multiple times a year about the horrible, deadly pesticide residues found on produce, so I can t believe they would be shocked to hear such accusations against them. I say, let s give a seat at our Dispatch table to the grant makers in California for daring to take on the scaremongers at EWG, adds ACSH's Dr. Elizabeth Whelan.