Tomatoes

If you wash them,

the skins of non-organic tomatoes

are still good for you

because they are so thin

that many pesticides

just pass straight through them into the pulp.

Contrary to the common myth,

organic tomatoes are not pesticide free -

it is virtually impossible to grow tomatoes

commercially without using some form of pesticide.

The main difference

between organic and non-organic tomatoes

in this respect is that the pesticides

used on non-organic tomatoes

are much better researched,

the dosages more strictly controlled,

and they tend to degrade much faster

than organic pesticides -

many of which essentially last forever.

Given what I said earlier about tomato skins

being an ineffective barrier to pesticides,

I would much rather eat non-organic tomatoes

than organic ones since the pesticide content

is much less likely to be harmful to me.

This is not just my opinion,

there is are large numbers of scientific papers

examining the toxicity of non-organic pesticide

residue on humans.

The work on organic pesticides

remains inadequate in my view.