Geneva Green Market: Geneva, Illinois - A Local Food Green Farmers Market

Packing school lunches in reusable lunchboxes protects our environment from unnecessary waste, but it is also important to protect our children from food containers that are potentially harmful. Along with avoiding plastic-leaching #7 water bottles, we must now look for lead-free lunchboxes. Back in February 2007, the Boston Globe reported that while the Consumer Product Safety Commission told consumers that the amount of lead in found in vinyl lunchboxes was safe, the specialists that actually performed the tests were alarmed by the lead levels found in 20% of the lunchboxes that were tested. The CPSC’s argument was that food is rarely in direct contact with the lunchboxes and children are not likely to put their mouths directly on the boxes. Words such as “rarely” and “not likely” imply that there is a chance that children could be exposed to hazardous levels of lead if parents and children do not handle their toxic lunchbox properly. Although it is common sense that children should not lick their lunchbox, it makes even more sense to store food a non-toxic container.

There are inexpensive products available at www.leadcheck.com to test lunchboxes that you already own, but if you need to purchase new lunchboxes the Center for Environmental Health recommends avoiding vinyl altogether.  In the wake of these findings the FDA urges consumers to switch to paper bags as an alternative, but choosing between the environment and health is unnecessary. At www.reusablebags.com a number of lead-free, environmentally friendly bags are available.