Latest Fact Sheet

Season 4, Ep 4 - Berries

·Whether frozen, dried, locally grown or imported, we can now buy berries all year round.

·According to household spend strawberries are by far our most popular berry.

·Botanists might argue that many of the ‘berries’ we know and love are not berries at all. According to the strict botanical definition a berry is a fleshy fruit of a single ovary with multiple internal seeds and that excludes many of our favourites – including the strawberry, raspberry and blackberry.

·A berry which has enjoyed a recent surge in popularity is the blueberry. Household spend has risen from less than a million to more than ten million dollars in just the last 6 years.

·Oranges are what many of us reach for when we have a cold but weight for weight strawberries and kiwifruit both contain more vitamin C, while blackcurrants contain four times as much.

·The term superfruit - something that’s been used in marketing - is used to refer to fruits that are high in anti-oxidants.

·When it comes to berry advertising, superfruit and anti-oxidants are certainly buzzwords. In fact, research suggests we’re 55-60% more likely to buy or stay with a product which makes an anti-oxidant health claim.

·Of the better known berries, Cranberries come in with the highest amount of antioxidants, blackcurrants are second, followed by blackberries, raspberries and blueberries.

·Unfortunately, new research suggests the compounds in berries may only act as anti-oxidants in the test tube. However, it seems that some of the compounds in berries do have positive effects on our body, this just isn’t due to antioxidant activity.

·Research shows compounds in pomegranates are good for your heart, blackcurrants can help asthma and cranberries benefit the urinary tract.

·Anthocyanins are part of a group of antioxidants known as phenolics, which give red, blue and purple berries their colour. International studies have shown a diet rich in them may improve memory.

·In 2010, 94% of fruit and vegetables targeted by MAF Food Safety’s Food Surveillance Programme, tested positive for pesticide residues and berries are no exception.

·In the 2009 Total Diet Study, the strawberry samples contained a total of fourteen pesticides. The grapes, which meet the botanical definition of a berry, contained a total of 12 pesticides. The kiwifruit had three and the raisins eight pesticides.

·There is debate about whether mixtures of different pesticides could have a worse effect than the pesticides considered individually (the ‘toxic cocktail effect’) but MAF Food Safety say that research suggests that this isn’t a problem.

·Winter strawberries are more contaminated with pesticides than summer strawberries and are also more likely to be imported. The latest Total Diet Study found a total of six pesticides on strawberries bought in January and February compared with 13 found on imported strawberries bought in July and August.

·Dried berries, like raisins, are available year round and have a much longer shelf-life than fresh berries but many contain additives.

·Sulphur dioxide is sometimes added to dried fruit to stop it going brown.

·Sulphur dioxide canhave nasty side effects for those intolerant to it. These include, stomach upsets, hives, and in severe cases anaphylactic shock. If you want to avoid sulphites like sulphur dioxide, look out for food numbers starting with a double two.

·Frozen berries can be a good choice - often they are picked and processed on the same day, so those nutrients are retained.

·In our lab tests, canned berries were best for folate and vitamin C intake while the frozen berries contained the most fibre.

Read more about Berries via these links.