Top Weedkiller Found in Some ‘Natural’ Bigelow Tea, Lawsuit Says

Organic Consumers Association says Bigelow made false claims
Lawsuit ‘frivolous,’ cup of tea has no glyphosate: Bigelow CEO

Tea leaves move along a drying belt while being processed at the Charleston Tea Plantation in Wadmalaw Island, South Carolina, U.S., on Thursday, Aug. 10, 2017. The Charleston Tea Plantation is the largest and oldest production farm in the growing domestic tea industry, located on 127 acres in the Southeast United States, it is home to the idyllic conditions for growing tea, a commodity most often associated with regions of Asia and Africa.Photographer: Luke Sharrett/Bloomberg

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By Shruti Singh

December 20, 2017 at 9:21 PM UTC

Updated on

December 21, 2017 at 4:23 PM UTC

This article is for subscribers only.

The world’s most widely used herbicide, which is at the center of an intense debate over whether it poses a cancer risk, has been found in samples of green tea produced and marketed as “natural” by R.C. Bigelow Inc., according to a lawsuit filed by the Organic Consumers Association.

Internal tests at Bigelow, the No. 2 U.S. tea brand by retail value, showed when the tea is brewed the level is “absolutely zero,” said R.C. Bigelow Inc. Chief Executive Officer Cindi Bigelow, whose grandmother founded the company. The claims are “frivolous,” she said in an interview before the lawsuit was filed.