The Impact of Pesticides on Bioactive Molecules in Vegetables

Organic agriculture is a production system that, due to the very low or absent use of pesticides, has as its main advantage the absence of the risk of transmitting toxic substances to the population. Another advantage of organic agriculture over conventional agriculture is the reduction of the impact of pesticides on the environment. In this work, the metabolic changes presented by three selected organic and conventional vegetables were analyzed (pepper, parsley and ginger) using redox titration and enzymatic methods, with a focus on fresh products. The results show increased accumulations of reactive oxygen species (ROS) and, implicitly, a very high activity against oxidative stress, in the case of the three vegetables from conventional agriculture. Therefore, increasing organic farming practices can largely eliminate both the risks posed by dietary exposure to pesticides and the negative impact on the environment. Encouraging farmers to adopt organic farming in parallel with developing policies to support and supply supermarkets with ecological food.