FDA Pesticide Report: Imports Fail 9x More Often

On September 30, 2026, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) released its annual Pesticide Residue Monitoring Program Report for Fiscal Year 2024. The federal evaluation tested human and animal foods across the nation and found that 98.2 percent of domestic human food samples complied with federal safety limits. In contrast, imported foods showed a 15.6 percent violation rate, which the agency noted is nearly nine times higher than the domestic violation rate.

Key takeaways

• Domestic samples: 98.2 percent of domestic human food samples complied with Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) pesticide tolerances, with 36.8 percent showing zero detectable residues.
• The import violation rate reached 15.6 percent (84.4 percent compliance), an increase characterized by the FDA as slightly higher than the 10.5 to 13.5 percent range recorded across FY2018 through FY2023.
• The vast majority of import infractions were no-tolerance violations, occurring when a pesticide was detected that has no established EPA tolerance for that specific crop.
• Roughly 80 percent of all violative residues across the testing program were measured at trace levels below 0.1 parts per million (ppm).
• Specific imported commodities showed high violation rates that FDA flagged for special attention, including prickly pear (86.4 percent), cilantro (43.8 percent), spinach (41.9 percent), and rice (27.9 percent).

What happened

On September 30, 2026, the FDA published its comprehensive Pesticide Residue Monitoring Program Report for Fiscal Year 2024. The report captures federal surveillance testing conducted between October 1, 2023, and September 30, 2024, examining human food and animal feed across the United States. The testing protocol screened food lots for 781 distinct pesticides and selected industrial chemical compounds.

In total, federal regulatory laboratories analyzed 3,528 human food samples. This included 893 domestic samples collected across 46 states and 2,635 imported food samples originating from 76 foreign countries and economies. The agency published the summarized findings via an FDA Constituent Update and published the full FY2024 report (PDF).

Alongside standard crop surveillance, the agency completed targeted sampling of domestic animal-derived foods. That targeted human food subset analyzed 110 total domestic samples, comprising 29 milk, 34 shell egg, 19 honey, and 28 game meat samples. In that group, 100 percent of samples complied with federal standards, with zero violative residues found and 93.6 percent showing no detectable residues whatsoever. For animal feed, the FDA analyzed 306 samples, establishing compliance rates of 93.5 percent for domestic animal food and 91.5 percent for imported feed.

What changed

The gap between domestic and imported samples was wide in FY2024. In the domestic human food supply, 98.2 percent of samples met legal standards, leaving a violation rate of just 1.8 percent. For imported human foods, compliance dropped to 84.4 percent, pushing the import violation rate to 15.6 percent.

According to the FY2024 report, historical monitoring between FY2018 and FY2023 saw domestic violation rates range from 1.3 to 3.8 percent, while import violation rates fluctuated between 10.5 and 13.5 percent. Because the FY2024 import violation rate hit 15.6 percent, the FDA officially described this import rate as slightly higher than recent years. The agency explicitly stated that the import violation rate was nearly 9 times higher than the domestic violation rate.

The regulatory nature of these violations reveals an important operational detail. A violative finding is a legal compliance finding, not by itself a health-risk assessment. The FDA identifies two categories of violations: over-tolerance violations (where a pesticide exceeds an established legal residue limit) and no-tolerance violations (where a pesticide residue is found on a commodity for which the EPA has not established a tolerance).

Among the 16 violative domestic samples identified in FY2024, 15 involved no-tolerance violations and 3 involved over-tolerance residues (some individual samples contained multiple residues). Among the 411 violative imported samples, 373 contained no-tolerance violations and 115 contained over-tolerance violations. The FDA noted that most import violations were no-tolerance violations. Furthermore, about 80 percent of all violative residues were measured below 0.1 parts per million (ppm).

Across all analyzed human food, the FDA detected residues of 215 different pesticides. The five most frequently detected chemical substances were:

• Azoxystrobin (identified in 427 samples)
• Imidacloprid (identified in 416 samples)
• Thiamethoxam (identified in 304 samples)
• Fludioxonil (identified in 283 samples)
• Cypermethrin (identified in 268 samples)

In addition to these frequently identified compounds, the agency reported finding glyphosate residues in 68 samples and chlorpyrifos residues in 142 samples.

Who is affected

Commodity breakdown figures published by the FDA demonstrate that violation risks differ significantly across food categories. While domestic foods across almost all categories remained largely free of illegal residues, imported produce and pantry staples displayed notable vulnerability.

By broad commodity group, the human food testing revealed substantial divergence between domestic and foreign lots:

• Imported grains: 21.4 percent violative, compared to 3.2 percent for domestic grains.
• Imported vegetables: 16.8 percent violative, compared to 2.8 percent for domestic vegetables.
• Imported fruits: 13.3 percent violative, compared to 0.4 percent for domestic fruits.
• Other food products: 17.4 percent violative for imports, compared to 0 percent for domestic products.

In Table 9 of the technical report, the FDA singled out specific imported commodities that warrant special attention. To qualify for this regulatory spotlight, a commodity had to have at least 20 samples analyzed or at least 3 violations, alongside an overall violation rate of 10 percent or higher. The commodities flagged by the agency include:

• Prickly pear: 86.4 percent violation rate (22 samples tested)
• Cilantro: 43.8 percent violation rate (32 samples tested)
• Spinach: 41.9 percent violation rate (31 samples tested)
• Onions, leeks, scallions, and shallots: 36.5 percent violation rate (74 samples tested)
• Dates: 36.0 percent violation rate (25 samples tested)
• Mung beans: 29.1 percent violation rate (55 samples tested)
• Peas: 28.6 percent violation rate (56 samples tested)
• Rice: 27.9 percent violation rate (165 samples tested)
• Olive oil: 25.9 percent violation rate (27 samples tested)
• Limes: 21.6 percent violation rate (51 samples tested)
• Sesame seeds: 18.6 percent violation rate (43 samples tested)
• Lemons: 17.2 percent violation rate (29 samples tested)
• Hot peppers: 14.0 percent violation rate (86 samples tested)
• Cashews: 13.8 percent violation rate (29 samples tested)
• Strawberries: 12.0 percent violation rate (92 samples tested)

What it means for shoppers

For everyday grocery shoppers, understanding what an FDA residue violation means is crucial for avoiding panic while making informed purchases. On the official FDA FY2024 Pesticide Data Page, the agency reiterates that overall pesticide residue concentrations in the U.S. food supply remain well below established safety standards. A no-tolerance violation means the EPA has no tolerance for that pesticide on that crop; on its own it is not a measure of health risk.

Where a country of origin is shown on produce, nuts, grains or oils, it tells you whether an item was imported. In FDA's FY2024 samples, domestic foods had far fewer violations than imports (1.8 percent versus 15.6 percent), and imported cilantro, spinach and rice were among the commodities FDA flagged.

Pesticide residues are not listed on ingredient labels, and packaged foods with many ingredients rarely say where each one was grown. For other recent import-related food safety news, see UK Salmonella outbreak linked to imported eggs, and for what labels do disclose, see how to read a food label.

Shoppers should also know what this monitoring cannot establish: the FDA data summary does not quantify individual long-term toxicological outcomes, assess personal metabolic responses, or provide comparative pesticide data between certified organic and conventional samples in this release.

The background

Under the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act, the EPA establishes legal residue limits, known as tolerances, for each pesticide chemical that may be present on specific raw or processed foods. A tolerance represents the maximum chemical concentration legally permitted to remain on that food commodity. It is the FDA's statutory duty to enforce these tolerances for both domestically produced food moving through interstate commerce and imported goods arriving at U.S. ports of entry.

The agency's annual sampling regime is not completely random; it prioritizes surveillance based on dietary importance. The FDA explicitly focuses its monitoring resources on raw agricultural commodities that play significant roles in the human diet, as well as foods that are routinely consumed in large quantities by infants and young children.

From FY2018 through FY2023, domestic violation rates stayed between 1.3 and 3.8 percent, while import rates ranged from 10.5 to 13.5 percent. Pesticide registrations differ between countries, so a residue of a pesticide with no U.S. tolerance for that crop counts as a no-tolerance violation regardless of how low the measured level is.

What to watch next

The FY2024 data are also available on the FDA Pesticide Report Data Dashboard. The commodities in Table 9 are the ones FDA itself flagged as warranting special attention.

Several key data points and regulatory actions were not disclosed in the agency's initial press update:

• The FDA did not disclose which specific foreign nations or exporting countries supplied the violative import samples.
• The agency did not identify specific brand names or retail labels for any sampled commodities.
• The release does not mention any illnesses linked to the residues found.
• The release did not include health-risk assessments of individual chemical residues or specify whether new Import Alerts were enacted against specific foreign firms as a direct result.
• Total Diet Study results are excluded from these data files, and the release gives no organic-versus-conventional comparison.

Consumers curious about the processing agents, additives, and ingredients on their pantry labels can scan packaged items directly using the Aurascan mobile app to review verified ingredient disclosures without numeric guesswork.