30% of herbal tea samples tested in Nantou found excessive pesticide residues

Modern people lead a fast-paced and stressful life. Many people are accustomed to making a pot of herbal tea after work to enjoy the pleasure of taking a break from their busy schedule. However, the Nantou County Government Health Bureau recently released an inspection report on commercially available fruits, vegetables and herbal teas, and found that among the seven herbal inspection items, two had excessive pesticide residues, and the failure rate exceeded 28%.

The Nantou County Government announced the results of an inspection of herbal tea sold on the market in September and found that two out of seven samples had excessive amounts of pesticide residues, with a failure rate of nearly 30%. (Photography by Huang Manying)

In order to protect consumers' food hygiene and safety, the Nantou County Government Health Bureau conducted random inspections of commercially available fruits, vegetables, and herbal teas for pesticide residues in supermarkets, organic stores, farms, and other sales locations in September. A total of 7 fruits and vegetables and 7 herbs were tested. The results showed that all fruits and vegetables complied with regulations, but among flowers and plants, one piece of chrysanthemum and one piece of rosemary were found to have excessive pesticide residues.

The illegal tribute chrysanthemums were sampled from Baoyuan Ginseng Herb Store in Mingjian Township, Nantou County, and were found to contain excessive amounts of the pesticide "Damidhin" and the pesticide "Bikmin", which is not allowed to be used in this category. Rosemary was found to contain excessive amounts of two pesticides, "amitriptyline" and "fortuna", and the sampling location was Taiguang Herb Garden in Puli Township, Nantou.

The Nantou County Government Health Bureau stated that the unqualified tribute chrysanthemum product was traced back to Kaohsiung City, and has been referred to the local health bureau for follow-up handling. In addition, regarding the unqualified rosemary products in the jurisdiction, the operators will be interviewed to trace the source and manufacturing process, and the sellers will be notified to remove the products from the shelves and recall them and not to sell them. The products will be listed for regular inspection and random sampling.

However, the Department of Health also stated that food safety is primarily about controlling the source. In order to effectively reduce the problem of pesticide residues in fruits and vegetables, the department will continue to strengthen random inspections of products on the market, implement source field monitoring, and strengthen guidance for farmers in production areas to correctly apply pesticides during planting.

In addition, people can also soak herbal tea with cold water and then with hot water before drinking it to remove residual pesticides.