大学英语西方文化概论课文翻译

英语翻译1

Eating Food That’s Better for You, Organic or Not

吃对你有益的食物，无论是否有机

In the six-and-one-half years since the federal government began certifying food as “organic,” Americans have taken to the idea with considerable enthusiasm.

自从联邦政府六年半前开始对食物“有机”认证以来，美国人以相当大的激情接受了这个概念。

Sales have at least doubled, and three-quarters of the nation’s grocery stores now carry at least some organic food.

销售额至少翻倍，国内3/ 4的食品杂货现在都在出售有机食品。

A Harris Poll in October 2007 found that about 30 percent of Americans buy organic food at least on occasion, and most think it is safer, better for the environment and healthier.

2007年10月的一份哈里斯民意调查发现大约30%的美国人至少会偶尔买有机食品，大部分人认为它更为安全，更有利于环境和更健康。

People believe it must be better for you if it’s organic,” says Phil Howard, an assistant professor of community, food and agriculture at Michigan State University.

密歇根州立大学的社区、食品和农业助理教授Phil Howard说，“人们认为如果它是有机的话一定会对你更好。”

So I discovered on a recent book tour around the United States and Canada.

最近我在美国和加拿大宣传新书时发现了这个问题。

No matter ho w carefully I avoided using the word “organic” when I spoke to groups of food enthusiasts about how to eat better, someone in the audience would inevitably ask, “What if I can’t afford to buy organic food?”

当我和食物爱好群体交流如何吃得更好时，无论我再怎么小心地避免使用“有机”这个词语，读者中还是会有人不可避免地问及“如果我买不起有机食品怎么办？”

Organic food seems to have become the magic cure for all.

有机食品似乎变成万能的神奇疗法。

When people think of eating it, they think they are eating well, healthily, reasonably, even morally.

人们在吃它的时候，他们认为自己吃得好，吃得健康，吃得合理甚至是有道德的。

But eating “organic” offers no guarantee of any of that.

但是吃“有机”食品不能对这些提供保障。

And the truth is that most Americans eat so badly — we get 7 percent of our calories from soft drinks, more than we do from vegetables; the top food group by caloric intake is “sweets”; and one-third of nation’s adults are now obese — that the organic question is a secondary one.

而事实是大部分美国人吃得很糟糕——我们从软饮料（不含酒精的饮料）中获取7%的卡路里，多于我们从蔬菜中所获取的卡路里；卡路里摄取量最多的食品类别是糖果；国内1/3的成年人现在都超重——这样一来有机食品问题成了次要问题。

It’s not unimportant, but it’s not the primary issue in the way Americans eat.

它不是不重要，但它不是美国人饮食的首要问题。

To eat well, says Michael Pollan, the author of In Defense of Food, means avoiding “edible food-like substances” and sticking to real ingredients, increasingly from the plant

kingdom. (Americans each consume an average of nearly two pounds a day of animal products.)

《食物防御》的作者Michael Pollan说，要吃得好就意味着要避免‘可食用的类似食品食品的物质’，并逐渐地坚持从蔬菜中获取真正的营养成分。（平均每个美国人每天消费近两磅的肉类产品。）

There’s plenty of evidence that both a person’s health — as well as the environment’s — will improve with a simple shift in eating habits away from animal products and highly processed foods to plant products and what might be called “real food.”

有充足的证据表明，只要对饮食习惯做简单的改变，把吃肉类食品和高度加工食品的习惯转为食用蔬果类食品和那些能被成为“真正的食品”，就能增进一个人的健康和改善环境。

From these changes, Americans would reduce the amount of land, water and chemicals used to produce the food we eat, as well as the incidence of lifestyle diseases linked to unhealthy diets, and greenhouse gases from industrial meat production.

这些转变会使美国人减少用于生产食物的土地，水和化学品，同时降低与不健康饮食有关的生活方式引发的疾病的发病率，减弱因工业肉类生产产生的温室效应。

The government’s organic program, says Joan Shaffer, a spokeswoman for the Agriculture Department, “is a marketing program that sets standards for what can be certified as organic. Neither the enabling legislation nor the regulations address food safety or nutrition. ”

“政府的有机计划，”农业部发言人Joan Shaffer说，“是给可以认证为有机的食品设立标准的一项市场计划，无论是授权法条或是规定都没有处理食品安全和营养问题。”

People don’t understand that, nor do they realize “organic” doesn’t mean “local.”

人们不明白这些东西，也不知道“有机”并不意味“本土”。

“It doesn’t matter if it’s from the farm down the road or from Chile,” Ms. Shaffer said. “As long as it meets the standards, it’s organic.”

“无论食品是从路边的农场或是从智利运来”，Shaffer女士说，“只要符合标准，它就是有机的。”

Hence, the organic status of salmon flown in from Chile, or of frozen vegetables grown in China and sold in the United States — no matter the size of the carbon footprint left behind by getting from there to here.

因此，从智利空运来的鲑鱼或是在美国出售的中国种植的冷冻蔬菜都是有机的，与食物从哪里飞到这里来所留下的碳排放量无关。

Today, most farmers who practice truly sustainable farming, or what you might call “organic in spirit,” operate on small scale, some so small that they can’t afford the requirements to be certified organic by the government.

今天大部分农民在实践真正的可持续农业，或者你可能称之为“精神上的有机”的农民都实行小规模经营，有一些的规模小到无法承担让政府进行有机认证的费用。

But the organic food business is now big business, and getting bigger.

但有机食品商业现在是大产业，而且日益壮大。

Professor Howard estimates that major corporations now are responsible for at least 25 percent of all organic manufacturing and marketing.

Howard教授估计现在大公司至少占整个有机生产与销售市场的25%。