An overwhelming amount of people believe this to be true, but the fact is that organic farms do use pesticides. In fact, over 20 chemicals “commonly used in the growing and processing of organic crops…are approved by the US Organic Standards,” Scientific American reported. The only difference is that they are made from natural chemicals, not synthetic ones.
The EPA hadn’t tested natural pesticides until very recently. The more we learn about some of the plant- and animal-based pesticides used in factory organic farming (such as copper sulfate and pyrethrum), the more we find that a few are actually more toxic than their synthetic counterparts — and since they’ve been deemed “natural,” they they’ve been applied more liberally than synthetic pesticides had been in the past.
In reality, the only way to be sure what your organically-labeled food has or hasn’t come into contact with is to personally know your local farmer and their methods. If the farm’s process adheres to even tighter standards than the USDA puts into place, there will certainly be less pesticide residue than conventional farming; you are free to decide if it is worth the higher price tag.