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  3. "You don’t have to wait for government to move... the really fantastic thing

"You don’t have to wait for government to move... the really fantastic thing

游客2023-12-15  30
问题    "You don’t have to wait for government to move... the really fantastic thing about Fairtrade is that you can go shopping ! "So said a representative of the Fairtrade movement in a British newspaper. Similarly Marion Nestle, a nutritionist at New York University, argues that "when you choose organics, you are voting for a planet with fewer pesticides, richer soil and cleaner water supplies. "
   The idea that shopping is the new politics is certainly seductive. Never mind the ballot box: vote with your supermarket trolley instead. Elections occur relatively rarely, but you probably go shopping several times a month, providing yourself with lots of opportunities to express your opinions. If you are worried about the environment, you might buy organic food ; if you want to help poor farmers, you can do your bit by buying Fairtrade products; or you can express a dislike of evil multinational companies and rampant globalisation by buying only local produce. And the best bit is that shopping, unlike voting, is fun; so you can do good and enjoy yourself at the same time.
   Sadly, it’s not that easy. There are good reasons to doubt the claims made about three of the most popular varieties of "ethical" food: organic food, Fairtrade food and local food. People who want to make the world a better place cannot do so by shifting their shopping habits: transforming the planet requires duller disciplines, like politics.
   Organic food, which is grown without man-made pesticides and fertilisers, is generally assumed to be more environmentally friendly than conventional intensive farming, which is heavily reliant on chemical inputs. But it all depends on what you mean by "environmentally friendly". Farming is inherently bad for the environment: since humans took it up around 11,000 years ago, the result has been deforestation on a massive scale. But following the ".green revolution"of the 1960s greater use of chemical fertiliser has tripled grain yields with very little increase in the area of land under cultivation. Organic methods, which rely on crop rotation, manure and compost in place of fertiliser, are far less intensive. So producing the world’s current agricultural output organically would require several times as much land as is currently cultivated. There wouldn’t be much room left for the rainforest.
   Fairtrade food is designed to raise poor fanners-incomes. It is sold at a higher price than ordinary food, with a subsidy passed back to the farmer. But prices of agricultural commodities are low because of overproduction. By propping up the price, the Fairtrade system encourages farmers to produce more of these commodities rather than diversifying into other crops and so depresses prices—thus achieving, for most fanners, exactly the opposite of what the initiative is intended to do. And since only a small fraction of the mark-up on Fairtrade foods actually goes to the farmer—most goes to the retailer—the system gives rich consumers an inflated impression of their largesse and makes alleviating poverty seem too easy.
   Surely the ease for local food, produced as close as possible to the consumer in order to minimise "food miles"and, by extension, carbon emissions, is clear? Surprisingly, it is not. A study of Britain’s food system found that nearly half of food-vehicle miles (ie, miles travelled by vehicles carrying food) were driven by cars going to and from the shops. Most people live closer to a supermarket than a farmer’s market, so more local food could mean more food-vehicle miles. Moving food around in big, carefully packed lorries, as supermarkets do, may in fact be the most efficient way to transport the stuff.
   What’s more, once the energy used in production as well as transport is taken into account, local food may turn out to be even less green. Producing lamb in New Zealand and shipping it to Britain uses less energy than producing British lamb, because farming in New Zealand is less energy-intensive. And the local-food movement’s aims, of course, contradict those of the Fairtrade movement, by discouraging rich-country consumers from buying poor-country produce. But since the local-food movement looks suspiciously like oldfashioned protectionism masquerading as concern for the environment, helping poor countries is presumably not the point.   [br] Which of the following is one of the blame local-food movement incurs?
选项 A、It intentionally increases carbon emissions.
B、It is not beneficial to poor countries indeed.
C、It reduces the use of carefully packed lorries.
D、It discourages customers to buy good produce.
答案 B
解析 细节题。由local-food movement定位至最后两段。末段最后一句指出：helping poor countries is presumably not the point，即作者认为本地食品运动大概压根儿就没想过要帮助穷国，这是他批评该运动的一个方面，[B]符合原文，故为答案；倒数第二句指出diseouraging rich-country consumers from buying poor-country produce，这里没有提到good produce，排除[D]。倒数第二段最后一句指出Moving food around in big，carefully packed lorries，as supermarkets do，may in fact be the most efficient way to transport the stuff．结合前文，虽然[C]是符合原文的细节，但不是招致批评的直接原因，排除；该段首句作者对地产食品能够减少二氧化碳排放提出质疑，但没有说是故意增加排放，排除[A]。  
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