[valarauko]

I suggest asking your Indian friends where they buy their spices from, and check out your local Indian grocery store - the spices are from major Indian brands and undergo a lot of testing, with additional certification for export to the US.

[itsoktocry]

>check out your local Indian grocery store - the spices are from major Indian brands and undergo a lot of testing, with additional certification for export to the US.

Well, uh, I'm no expert, having just read about this here, today. But what you are saying flies in the face of half of the comments here, doesn't it? What makes you sure that the "local Indian grocery store" is getting high-quality, tested spices?

[valarauko]

Let's take one of the source studies linked in other comments and investigate:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5415259/

The product recalls mentioned are all American brands, and their origin is unspecified - other than South Asia, turmeric is also exported from China, SE Asia, the Caribbean and South America. In the absence of FDA guidelines on lead levels in spices, this study has used the lead levels in candy as the threshold (0.1 ppm) The study also highlights a previous case study in Boston where 4 pediatric cases had lead exposure - of the 4, only one had detectable lead in the family's turmeric - at a level of 1.4 ppm. This was a 12-month-old baby, so wasn't consuming the turmeric, and the case study doesn't suggest he was.

The Indian food safety standards restrict lead in spices to below 2.5 ppm, with turmeric especially tested for lead chromate (FSSAI standards allow lead upto 10 ppm (!!!) in turmeric, while AGMARK allows only upto 2.5 ppm). Turmeric being exported from India to the USA has several additional mandatory certifications required, for other dyes like Sudan I - IV, aflatoxins, pesticides, etc. Since the FDA has no limits published on lead, the Indian limits of 2.5 ppm probably apply. Is that an acceptable level? Probably not great, and there is no safe level of lead. However, lead will show up in any agricultural product, so we need a reasonable 'acceptable' range. For me and most other Indians who consume turmeric on a daily basis, we defer to the Indian certifications.

[Ctyra]

I use Indian grocery stores here in the US. I have not seen any brands with AGMARK. Do you have any recommendation for brands that I can trust?

[valarauko]

Sorry for the delay - just noticed this comment.

Looking at my own pantry of Indian branded spices I purchased from Indian grocery stores, I see they are packaged in the UAE and not India, and don't carry the AGMARK. I couldn't find any details on the certifications required for spices in the Emirates.