Tea is one of the most popular drinks enjoyed around the world. Americans drink up to 80 billion cups of teaa year while their Canadian neighbors drink almost 10 billion cups of tea a year (1,2).
Since tea is often praised as a healthy drink, The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) decided to investigate whether or not the most popular tea brands contained traces of pesticides in their products that could undermine the health benefits of the tea.
They found out that an inspection done by the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) three years ago concluded that 1 in 4 teas contained pesticide residue far above the safety limit set by Health Canada. Both the dry leaves and steeped tea contained these traces.
To find out if the worst offenders are still on the market, CBC hired an accredited lab to retest some of Canada’s most popular brands, including Lipton, Red Rose, Tetley, and Twinings.
The full list includes:
- Twinings – Earl Grey
- Tetley – green tea
- Lipton – yellow label black tea
- Signal – orange pekoe
- Uncle Lee’s Legends of China […]
First of all, our national broadcaster is a pale reflection of its former self. The CBC is now really a private broadcaster as it accepts ads for cash.
Any tea purchased could be expressly organic if you have discretion. Stay away from Chinese green tea as it has considerable residues of arsenic, the fallout from burning coal. Japanese or Sri Lankan is best.