Well said, Wehayley. I agree and am glad someone said it better than I could.

I'm sure the Taiwanese tea is effected by air pollution, but so what? This is never what is brought into question. There is a distinct difference between air pollution and tea leaves being drenched in pesticides, whether illegal ones or not, in amounts that are many times beyond maximum allowed levels of residue. Such practices are simply unacceptable. The EU, Japan, and others would heartily agree with me.

Perhaps some of the same sort of activity has happened before in Taiwan. But, if I do a google regarding this subject I will come across a whole collection of examples of where this has happened in China. I have yet to find an article about the unsafe administration of pesticides in tea grown in Taiwan. Heck, it's even possible that this has happened in Japan and the USA, but I am still at a loss to the relevancy of this. The point is, anything is possible. And the bottom line is, who has earned the reputation of having good and consistent quality control?

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If you're going to compare the USA to a health utopia then I would agree with you, Wehayley, that the USA has some very serious issues. But if you're going to compare it to China, then I think you're going to be hard pressed.

And while many in the alternative health fields are concerned with the use of hormones and antibiotics, if I were to cite the myriads of health concerns coming out of China, this example would look like child's play in comparison. And, if you force me to drudge up all that information, I'm certain I could succeed at it, but I just rather not.

I see no problem with flouride in toothpaste or water. Yes, I even have heard that flouride in the water is a government plot to dumb down the population. Well, at least my health guru, Dr. Andrew Weil, see's no problem with flouride in drinking water. Obviously there are those who disagree.

Aspartame is a choice, and I choose not to buy it. Many Chinese are inundated by food that is simply saturated in unsafe levels of pesticides. Here, I can buy organic... And if I choose not to buy organic, at least I know, or close to knowing, that it is in line with regulations on maximum allowed levels of residue. This sense of security, from what I have read, is sorely lacking in China.

Again, if you compare the U.S. to a health utopia you have a point. But if you compare the U.S. to other places, our food supply is pretty darn good!

My point is, I see nothing wrong with pointing the finger at China for its atrocious practices in terms of agriculture or whatever.... I don't know why this has struck a nerve, I wasn't offended by it at all. Furthermore, it is my belief that one of the ways China will be encouraged to clean up its act is by people sounding the alarm on issues that are unacceptable. I tip my hat, for example, to the EU for having stringent regulations in its importation of tea. Do I think this has helped contribute to China doing a better job at ensuring more of its tea is not drenched in pesticides? Obviously!

And, if you want to get into a diatribe about the United States health issues, by all means go for it! USA is not a health utopia, and I don't know anyone who has ever made that claim. I do know, however, that organic farming in the USA is growing by leaps and bounds and the knowledge of things such as trans fatty acids seems to be making some serious headway.

Ultimately, I think it's a tragedy... I think it's a tragedy that if I buy green tea from China I have to be concerned about some serious pesticide issues. It is my sincere hope that China develops very reliable quality control so that this concern will not longer be an issue. Afterall, the original subject was focusing on pesticides in tea, and ware from China, was it not?




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I think the tragedy is we never cared (at least not nearly to this extent) about what was going on in China before. As long as the shafting was one way. Child labor? Unsafe working conditions? Inadequate and unfair wages? Any moderately aware person knew this was going on, but where was the public outcry?

It was okay to exploit China--forget "China," its too big, it was okay to exploit people, children as long as we were getting affordable goods. I like the comparison to the Opium Wars; we in the West are still doing to China what we've been doing all along. IF China is shipping "poison" back to us, there is a certain justice in that.

What China is doing is deplorable, but I think we created this mess by not asking questions decades ago. Sure we want standards now that it effects us, or we know that it effects us. You blame China, I blame us. We've known all along someone was getting hurt; we only care if its us. Now we're just paying the price for years of apathy and avarice.

Ryan, et al... I agree with SpaceSamurai. I would also add that I wasn't defending China, only pointing out the need to be aware of what's happening right here under our collective nose, and to say that just as you have a choice in whether or not to buy organic, you also have a choice on whether or not to buy products from mainland China. By the way, the products don't get here without US importers bringing them in.

Now, if I had to defend China, it would be very easy to point out the extreme use of pesticides such as DDT and many others in the US for years. We nearly wiped out our own national symbol, the bald eagle, not to mention numerous other species that have been dramatically reduced or completely eliminated.

I've seen documentaries from the 1950s that show mosquitoe control trucks driving down Main Street America, releasing a stream of pesticides while school kids followed it to play in the fog. Just this past weekend, I saw a news story about one of our many communities that has been devastated by the run-off and dumpings of big business. The EPA is just slightly less than a national joke. The greenhouse effect is real, the ice caps are, in fact, melting, we have yet to sign to Kyoto Accord, and still we point at everyone else.

Anytime a river catches on fire, you've got a pollution problem. And it doesn't end there - look at all the oil spills we've been through, the radiation leaks at Three Mile Island. The intentional release of chemical agents on the NYC subway system, and venereal disease intentionally left untreated in specific, marginalized parts of the population.

If you find time, read the Flexnor report - dig into the background of alumininum and flouride. There are certainly safer ways of creating healthy teeth. China is going through growing pains, just as the United States did...

The conversation has yet to hit a nerve with me. I'm not upset with anyone. I'm just choosing to point out the elephant in the room...

I've thought that very thing many times myself.

I live in the US and I consume as little as possible from here for the reasons you pointed out. That's why most of my groceries are imported from Japan and Taiwan. The Chinese stuff poisons you quickly, the US food kills you slowly. I don't care for either of these options.

As for no one forcing consumers to buy from China, that was my exact point when I placed the blame on the consumer for what is happening to businesses in the US and Japan.




Don't worry, you only get jumped on when you insult the commies!

It is correct that air pollution was not my target; other forms of contamination were. As for Taiwanese high mountain oolongs, I believe, and hope, that they're far enough away from the pollution to avoid serious issues.




I do believe the FDA allows very unacceptable practices, and I avoid consuming much US food for this reason. I would, however, rate US food quality well above that of China. In the US, the problem is trans fats, high fructose corn syrup, aspartame, etc. In food from China, you can find lead, industrial chemicals and dies, pharmecuticals, and worse.



Fluoride in public water supplies is state-forced medication. Chlorine, etc. are added to make the water safe to drink. Fluoride is not. It is added strictly as a medication.




I'm glad someone got my point without being offended!



Unfortunately, with big companies like Monsanto expanding, their GM (genetically modified) crops are contaminating many of the organic farms. This has been happening in the state of Vermont. Seeds, etc. will travel many miles under natural causes like wind, and these eventually land in and mix with the crops of legitimate organic farms.

Blame CPC (Chinese Communist Party). China was a great, inventive and innovative nation with an awesome culure, arts, craftsmen, inventors, education, etc. Then Mao came along and turned China into one huge slave plantation/police state/junk yard. Innovation ceased, the arts started to disappear, and so on. In fact, those who made China great were the targets of the communists, and they were killed in the tens of millions.

I blame "US" only as far as we allowed Mao and the communists to takeover China, the same as we allowed communist Stalin to remain in power in Russia.

The Chinese communists will address the food/tea contamination issue only if they have to and only if it affects their bottom line.

I´m * tired of this reading of stories about extra harmful Chinese products and maybe some of you think that chinese mainland teas are acid rain special edition teas or what not. Truth is, I have been to China 4 years ago, and I didn´t see any special poison-related problems. I have also drunk Chinese teas since, nearly every day and third of the days I drink more than 4 pots a day and...WOW...nothing has happened to me because of that. I´m 17 right now, so the consequences of drinking poisonous tea would show even more because i´m underage, right?

I'm sure not all Chinese tea is dangerous, but can you tell which is which? Have you ever actually been to China? I have, and let me tell you - that is one polluted place. I suggest you do a search on "chinese tea" + "pesticide" and look at the studies done on it.

Sure, you may not feel the effects when you are 17. Like, when you're 17, you can smoke 2 packs of cigarettes a day and your face looks as young as ever. However, I can sit in a room and look at people who are over 35 and tell who the smokers are just by the look of their skin. The accumulated effect of what you do/eat/drink in the first half of your life usually doesn't show up until the second half of your life. I'm telling you that from experience.

I know one way that garantees chinese tea to be organic, it's a certificate delivered by the Institute for Marketecology (IMO). It's a international agency for inspection, certification and quality assurance of eco-friendly products. It also combines strict social and Fairtrade standards with adaptability to local conditions. Some chinese tea farmers have acquired this certification and are selling real organic products that do not contain any pesticides or heavy metal

Yep, China is polluted partially, but I mean not that bad elsewhere. I travelled in China for 3 weeks, and during that time I visited like 15 towns some very far from each other, from eastern part of China to the central. I have some bad chinese teas, but man, they are not expensive and I wouldn´t expect much from them. Most of chinese teas I have from there were bought from (in chinese sense) expensive tea-shops and I have to tell that I can´t compare them to the cheap ones. There were many good ones and many very good ones, maybe 5% were just okay. As chinese quality-teas are quite cheap compared to the okay ones you can get elsewhere, why bother buying the chinese cheap ones which are not at all sure to be clean. I think that if you buy teas in decent shops, pollution and pesticides shouldn´t be a problem.

and sorry, wasn´t trying to start a flame.