Spinach is packed with nutrients – and pesticides, including at least one banned in the EU
RANKING UPDATED JUNE 11, 2025
Spinach is a nutrient-rich vegetable, making it a staple for healthy eating. But it also has more pesticide residues by weight than any other type of produce – three-fourths of non-organic, or conventional samples are contaminated with a neurotoxic insecticide, permethrin, which is banned from use on food crops in Europe.
Based on latest tests by the Department of Agriculture, spinach ranks first on our Dirty Dozen™ list of fruits and vegetables with the most pesticides.
The USDA’s most recent spinach tests, conducted in 2016, showed a sharp increase in pesticide residues on conventionally grown spinach since the crop was previously tested, in 2008 and 2009.
The USDA published results of a pesticide analysis for 642 conventional spinach samples collected in 2016.
The tests detected an average of seven pesticides on conventional spinach samples, with up to 19 different pesticides or breakdown products on a single sample.
Four pesticides – one insecticide and three fungicides – were responsible for the bulk of the residues detected on spinach.
Seventy-six percent of the samples contained residues of permethrin, a neurotoxic insecticide. Since 2000, Europe has not permitted any permethrin to be used on food crops.
At high doses, permethrin overwhelms the nervous system and causes tremors and seizures.
But several studies have also found a link between lower-level exposure to permethrin-type insecticides and neurological effects in children. In one study, children with detectable permethrin residues in their urine were twice as likely to be diagnosed with ADHD as those with undetectable levels of the pesticide.
Besides its use as a pesticide, permethrin is also used to kill head lice and is embedded in mosquito-repellent fabrics, which can also contribute to children’s exposure.
When the Environmental Protection Agency was assessing the health risks of permethrin and related pesticides on food, EWG wrote to the agency, urging it to consider potential risks to children’s brain development.
Three other fungicides – mandipropamid, fluopicolide and ametoctradin, which are used to kill mold and mildew – were found on spinach samples at relatively high concentrations. Little science has explored the potential human health risks of these chemicals.
Most of the pesticides found on conventional spinach samples are sanctioned as legal and safe by the EPA.
In 2016, 16 of 707 samples had concentrations that violated the EPA’s maximum pesticide residue limits. The USDA also found 83 samples with residues of pesticides that are prohibited for use on spinach but legal on other food crops.
Residues of DDT – a pesticide banned in the 1970s – and its breakdown products remain in the soil and were found on 40 percent of spinach samples. DDT breakdown products were detected in much lower concentrations than the other spinach pesticides but are far more toxic to people.
About EWG’s Shopper’s Guide
EWG has published the Shopper’s Guide to Pesticides in Produce almost every year since 2004.
It’s a suite of materials investigating the presence of pesticides in foods and helps consumers find ways to reduce exposure to pesticides while consuming plenty of fruits and vegetables.
It includes two lists, the first is the Clean Fifteen, the conventionally grown fruits and vegetables with very low or no traces of pesticides. The second is the Dirty Dozen, or the 12 fresh non-organic fruits and vegetables with the highest pesticide residues.
Some pesticides have more data linking them to health concerns than others. These pesticides are particularly concerning for children. The brain and nervous systems, as well as other physiological systems of young children are far from fully developed and are especially sensitive to disruption and damage from industrial chemicals, including pesticides.
The presence of so many different pesticides in foods is also also concerning from a public health standpoint. When regulating pesticides, government bodies consider them only one at a time without considering the potential total body burden for consumers. There’s little available data about how multiple pesticides interact with each other in the body or how such mixtures could compound each chemical’s individual potential health harms. But the data we do have, primarily from animal studies, suggests that when chemicals are present in a mixture, they can be more toxic combined than individually.
More information
Here are more resources from EWG’s Shopper’s Guide to Pesticides in Produce:
