Page 288 - e-Book

issue was not the criteria. The only way out was to pump in the inputs so that production

rises” and fulfill the demand of food. (DTE, 2000, pp31). Later it was observed that, High
Yielding Varieties (HYVs) and pesticides are among the regular practices, the varieties that

required large nitrogenous fertilizer and water, without they are poor variety and give less
production than indigenous varieties (Vandana Shiva, 1991).

It has been observed that, farmers use pesticides in haphazard manner, as a result of it we are
now facing different chronic diseases like cancer, heart problems, nephrological problems,

etc. Moreover, the frontline workers are more prone to pesticide risks such as farmers,
production centres and supply chain. Excessive use of pesticides leads to the health problems

in farmers and lead to the residues in food web. Same situation was observed in other part of
the world also. In a report entitled “Tropical farmers at Risk from Pesticides,” the IRRI

(International Rice research Institute) showed that 55% of farmers in the Philippines who

worked with pesticides suffered with abnormalities in eyes, 54% in different heart related
problems and 41% in lungs problems (IRRI, 1974). Similarly, situation in India is not

different. Improper handling and unsafe spraying of the agrochemicals cause high risk of
health hazards reported in the past studies (Bag, 2000; Gupta, 2004). Centre for Science and

Environment (CSE) accounted that pesticide exposure causes acute poisoning, cancer and
neurological impairment, reproductive and developmental problems (Arora, 2007 and Takagi

et al., 1997).

A group working on Environment, annually published a list of twelve fruits and vegetables
with the highest amount of pesticide residue and named it as: “dirty dozen”. In 2019, they

published “dirty dozens with the order of sequence of pesticide residue as- strawberry,

spinach, kale, nectarine, apple, grape, peach, cherry, pear, tomato, celery and potato (EWG,
2019). Another data obtained from United State Department of Agriculture from their

Pesticide Data Program they displayed a list of vegetables and fruits which contain different
types of pesticide residue in it as strawberry has 45 different types of residue, similarly,

apples (47), grapes (56), cherries (42), tomatoes (35), sweet bell peppers (53), etc. From this
data, it seems that we are not eating food but served with a plate with different pesticides.

Different researchers focus on the different aspects of ascorbic acid content of tomatoes and

other vegetables, like effect of cooking and peeling on ascorbic acid content of Solanum
melongena, Lycopersicon esculentum, Memordia charantia and Colocasia antiquorumafter

(Alvi et al., 2003). Effect of cooking and application of oil and vinegar on two different
varieties of tomatoes was determined by Sahlin et al., 2004, drying of tomatoes (Giovanellie

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