Imported food dangers

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Some vegetables you are eating could be likely to contain dangerous pesticides, banned, cancer-causing chemicals and poisonous lead and cadmium.

Secret Government test results obtained by Today Tonight under Freedom of Information are shocking to say the least.

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• Imported food contamination

Nutritionist and Toxicologist, Dr Geoff Skurray, said in some everyday foods, levels of toxic chemicals are up to hundreds of times more than the legal limit.

"It's scandalous really, because they don't have the strict laws that we have and they can use any pesticide they like," he said.

"They use human waste as a fertilizer on the vegetables and that's why we see all the dangerous chemicals and micro organisms coming in here."

A huge range of popular vegetables, imported mainly from China and destined for our tables, were found to contain illegal levels of the dangerous pesticide, chlorpyrifos.

Imported fresh garlic, peas, pickled cabbage, mustard, also lychees all contained chlorpyrifos.

"It's been banned in many countries, it can cause asthma and it can cause nervous problems, it accumulates in the body," Dr Skurray added.

Dr Skurray is concerned that fresh vegetables from China have grown 125 per cent in four years.

Imported garlic up to 95 per cent on the shelves is from China, also Mexico, Argentina and the United States.

Capsicum and asparagus imports have doubled from New Zealand, Greece, Belgium, Peru and Thailand.

"Salmonella is a deadly bacteria and when you put this in the food and it's not destroyed by cooking you are likely to get food poisoning, devastating food poisoning, particular of older people and young children," Dr Skurray said.

Batches of fresh peppers and sesame seeds failed tests with high levels of salmonella.

Consignment after consignment contained illegal levels of poisonous lead, a terrifying 260 times more than the legal limit. Lead can cause brain damage in children.

In imported peanuts, commonly from China, a number of tests found dangerous levels of cadmium, a known cancer-causing chemical in roasted, salted, blanched and ground peanuts. It was up to 27 times the legal safety limit.

"Cadmium's extremely toxic, it can cause cancer, it accumulates in the body and it can also cause all sorts of other diseases to the liver and kidney," Dr Skurray said.

"At that level it's extremely dangerous. You wouldn't find that in Australian peanuts."

Pistachio nuts contained up to 3000 times the legal limit of aflatoxins, an invisible mould and potent carcinogen linked to liver cancer.

Farmer, Richard Bovill organised Fair Dinkum Rallies around the nation in a bid to save Aussie growers from imports.

"We need to understand the difference between value and price and what we put into producing produce in Australia meets very high standards," he said.

"We need to make sure those standards are met by cheap imported products."

Australian Quarantine Inspection Services inspects just five of every 100 shipments of food coming into the country and only tests if a problem is suspected.

Included in these checks are imported frozen foods. It is this category of food that has health experts most concerned, because imports of frozen vegetable mixes for supermarkets are skyrocketing due to our huge consumer demand.

The most important things is keep eating plenty of fresh fruit and vegetables but remember to always wash or peel them thoroughly first.

Cooking can rid food of bacteria.

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