2024 Clean Fifteen List: 15 Foods You Don't Need to Buy Organic
Some fruits and vegetables are less likely to be contaminated with pesticide residues. Here's which ones.
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Penelope Wall oversees the digital editorial vision of EatingWell—drawing on both her passion for food, wellness and storytelling and over 20 years experience in digital content strategy and editorial. Penelope has a bachelor's degree in English and studio art and a minor in French from Middlebury College.
Eating more fruits and vegetables—organic or not—is better than eating none at all. And while many would love to be able to buy organic produce all the time, it can be expensive. Is the price of organic worth it for your health?
Pesticides can be absorbed into fruits and vegetables, leaving trace residues. Research has shown that higher exposure to pesticides may increase the risk of many health consequences, from immediate effects like throat irritation, nausea, diarrhea, abdominal cramps and dizziness to asthma, certain types of cancers and cognitive and reproductive issues from long-term exposure.1
One way to limit your exposure to pesticides is by choosing organic. But if that's not a financial reality for your family, you can also shop smarter: Buy conventional produce that's the least likely to contain pesticide residues and save your organic dollars for produce that tends to have the highest amounts of pesticide residue (aka the Dirty Dozen).
Every year, the Environmental Working Group (EWG), a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization, releases a Shopper's Guide to Pesticides that identifies fruits and vegetables with the highest and lowest pesticide residues.2 The Clean Fifteen is the list of foods that are least likely to be contaminated with pesticide residues, so if budget is a concern, you can feel good about buying these 15 fruits and vegetables conventional.3
Environmental Working Group. EWG’s 2024 Shopper’s Guide The Clean Fifteen.
According to EWG:
- Of the Clean Fifteen fruit and vegetable samples, almost 65% had no detectable pesticide residue.
- Avocados and sweet corn were the cleanest produce – less than 2 percent of samples of each showed any detectable pesticides.
- Just over 10% of Clean Fifteen fruit and vegetable samples had residues of two or more pesticides.
- No sample from the first six Clean Fifteen items tested positive for more than three pesticides.
Of note: Some produce—like corn and papayas—might be grown from genetically engineered seeds. If you try to avoid genetically engineered foods, you will want to opt for organic corn and papaya or find brands that carry the Non-GMO Project Verified label. Another way to tell if your produce is organic, conventional or genetically modified is to check the little PLU label on the produce.
Here's EWG's 2023 list of the Clean Fifteen, starting with the least contaminated food, along with some tasty ways to eat them.
