The Salinas Valley is one of California's largest and best-known regions for farming, with a rich agricultural history that was immortalized in John Steinbeck's novella "Of Mice and Men."

It's appropriate then, that Salinas is the focus of the CHAMACOS Study led by UC Berkeley professor Brenda Eskenazi. The study investigates the long term health of children living in a community where exposure to pesticides and other environmental chemicals is inevitable.

Mark Bittman interviews Eskenazi to find out more about the work of CHAMACOS and how she and her colleagues are working to make agricultural communities across the globe safer for children and families.