Two California Fruit Commissions End Lethal Animal Tests After PETA Appeal

Farmers No Longer Funding Strawberry and Table Grape Tests That Poison and Mutilate Animals—Experiments Continue for Walnuts and Dried Plums

For Immediate Release:
May 31, 2018

Contact:
Tasgola Bruner 202-483-7382

After PETA pointed out that deadly, farmer-funded fruit experiments on animals are cruel and inapplicable to humans, California’s Strawberry and Table Grape commissions stopped funding animal studies—but the state’s Walnut Commission and Dried Plum Board continue this wasteful practice.

In its letters to the commissions, PETA pointed out that since all the tests involved foods with no toxicity concerns, studies could be safely conducted using humans. Numerous human clinical studies on these foods have already been conducted and published.

“California’s Strawberry and Table Grape commissions did the right thing in ending cruel animal tests, which are irrelevant to human health, a waste of funds, and not required by any law,” says PETA Senior Vice President Kathy Guillermo. “PETA is calling on the California Walnut Commission and the California Dried Plum Board to end animal tests and for all four organizations to establish policies that prohibit funding experiments on animals ever again.”

Recent animal tests by these trade groups include the following:

• Experimenters funded by the California Strawberry Commission injected mice with a carcinogenic and neurotoxic chemical, had them ingest a chemical that induces inflammatory bowel disease, fed them strawberries, and then killed and dissected them.
• Experimenters funded by the California Table Grape Commission fed mice grapes, cut open their eyes, injected an herbicide into their retinas, measured their eye functions, and then killed and dissected the animals.
• Experimenters funded by the California Walnut Commission injected mice with cancer cells, fed them walnuts, and took their blood, and when their tumors grew to the “maximum allowable size,” the experimenters killed and dissected the animals.
• Experimenters funded by the California Dried Plum Board fed mice dried plums, starved them, took their blood, and then killed and dissected them.

Other fruit trade groups—including the National Processed Raspberry Council and the Washington Red Raspberry Commission—have ended all experiments on animals after discussions with PETA.

PETA’s letters to the fruit and nut commissions are available upon request. For more information, please visit PETA.org or click here.