92 Money Tree The Business of Organics

CHAPTER 1 Whole Foods CAN A SUPERMARKET REALLY BE ORGANIC? In 1980, John Mackey, a 27-year-old vegetarian, and his 23-year-old girlfriend, Renee Lawson, were running a small health food business in Austin, Texas, USA. They decided the time was right for an organic supermarket, so they merged their business with another store and opened Whole Foods Market. Their motto was: Whole Foods, Whole People, Whole Planet. Previously, health food stores had concentrated on herbal products, beans, fruits, and vegetables; but the new store also sold products such as fresh bread and local fish, meat, and cheese. The new supermarket was an immediate success and by 1985, Whole Foods had added stores in Dallas and Houston.

第一章全食超市真的是有机的吗？ 1980年，27岁的素食者约翰·麦基和他23岁的女友蕾妮·劳森在美国德克萨斯州奥斯汀市经营一家小型保健食品公司。 他们决定是时候开一家有机超市了，所以他们把自己的生意和另一家商店合并，开了一家全食超市。 他们的座右铭是：全食，全人类，整个地球。 以前，保健食品商店主要销售草药产品、豆类、水果和蔬菜；但新店也出售新鲜面包和当地的鱼、肉和奶酪等产品。 这家新超市立即获得了成功，到1985年，全食超市在达拉斯和休斯顿增加了门店。

The company began buying out its local competitors, and in 1992, it started opening stores throughout the USA. Since then, its varied organic produce, clean colorful stores, and friendly staff have proved a recipe for success. The Whole Foods success story has not been free of criticism, however. Although the company sells an image of high quality organic, local produce, the reality is often different. Most organic food in the USA actually comes from a few giant farms. This is because US food legislation makes it difficult for small farms to qualify as "organic." Also, a lot of the company's produce comes from abroad; and while goods from China and Mexico may be green, the amount of oil needed to transport them is certainly not. Many green activists insist that Whole Foods does not represent the model of sustainable local food that the organic pioneers intended. One of the biggest criticisms of the store, however, is its pricing. In fact, the company's promotion of healthy organic food as a lifestyle choice to the wealthy has even led some critics to change its motto to: "Whole Foods, Whole Paycheck..."

该公司开始收购其当地竞争对手，并于1992年开始在美国各地开设门店。 从那时起，它的各种有机产品，干净多彩的商店和友好的员工已经证明了成功的秘诀。 然而，全食超市的成功故事也并非没有批评。 尽管该公司销售的是高质量有机本地产品的形象，但实际情况往往不同。 美国的大多数有机食品实际上来自几个大型农场。 这是因为美国的食品法规使得小农场很难获得“有机”的资格。 此外，公司的很多产品都来自国外；虽然来自中国和墨西哥的货物可能是绿色的，但运输它们所需的石油数量肯定不是。 许多绿色活动人士坚持认为，全食超市并不代表有机食品先驱们所期望的可持续本地食品模式。 然而，对这家商店最大的批评之一是它的定价。 事实上，该公司向富人推广健康有机食品作为一种生活方式的选择，甚至导致一些批评者将其座右铭改为：“Whole Foods, Whole Paycheck……”

CHAPTER 2 What Is Organic Anyway? WHEN YOU THINK OF ORGANIC FOOD, WHAT WORDS COME TO MIND? NATURAL, LOCAL, ETHICAL? IN FACT, THE CLASSIFICATION OF ORGANIC FOOD IS A TRICKY BUSINESS. Until the 19th century, nobody would have considered farming as anything other than organic. Crops were fertilized using animal manure and compost. In the 18th and 19th centuries, however, chemists were discovering more about chemicals. The work of German chemist Justus von Liebig, in particular, led to the development of cheap nitrogen fertilizers. The agricultural revolution that followed, especially in Great Britain, brought about a huge increase in crop production. This helped feed the country's rapidly growing urban population and reduce famine. However, not everybody was convinced of the benefits of the new technologies.

第二章什么是有机食品？ 当你想到有机食品时，你会想到什么词？ 自然的，本地的，道德的？事实上，有机食品的分类是一件棘手的事情。 直到19世纪，没有人会认为农业不是有机的。 农作物用动物粪便和堆肥施肥。 然而，在18世纪和19世纪，化学家们发现了更多的化学物质。 特别是德国化学家Justus von Liebig的工作，导致了廉价氮肥的发展。 随后的农业革命，特别是在英国，带来了农作物产量的巨大增长。 这有助于养活该国快速增长的城市人口，减少饥荒。 然而，并不是每个人都相信新技术的好处。

Sir Albert Howard's experiences in India convinced him that correct animal and crop management in a local area produced strong pest-resistant plants that were superior to those grown with chemical fertilizers. He saw chemical fertilizers as expensive, unnecessary, and unsustainable and studied ways to farm productively but naturally. Howard himself never used the word organic. It was British agriculturalist Lord Northbourne who first referred to a farm as a single "organic whole," describing a more balanced, sustainable style of farming. Northbourne's ideas, however, were not widely accepted. The following years saw an increase in the use of fertilizers and pesticides, which allowed farmers to plant large quantities of single crops. Most farms became industrialized single-crop producers that depended on pesticides and fertilizers. Then in the 1970s, some people began to express their concerns about the negative effects of these methods on soil quality and the environment. These green activists began to call for a return to more traditional styles of farming.

艾伯特·霍华德爵士在印度的经历使他相信，在当地正确的动物和作物管理会产生强大的抗虫害植物，比用化肥种植的植物要好。 他认为化肥是昂贵的、不必要的、不可持续的，并研究了自然生产的方法。 霍华德本人从未使用过有机这个词。 英国农业学家诺斯伯恩勋爵（Lord Northbourne）首次将农场称为单一的“有机整体”，描述了一种更平衡、更可持续的农业方式。 然而，诺斯伯恩的想法并没有被广泛接受。 在接下来的几年里，化肥和杀虫剂的使用有所增加，这使得农民能够大量种植单一作物。 大多数农场成为依赖农药和化肥的工业化单一作物生产者。 然后在20世纪70年代，一些人开始担心这些方法对土壤质量和环境的负面影响。 这些绿色活动人士开始呼吁回归更传统的耕作方式。

At the same time, in other parts of the world modern methods were replacing traditional farming. In Mexico, Pakistan, and India, Nobel Prize-winning agriculturalist Norman Borlaug pioneered the use of new crops and technologies and greatly increased food production. Environmentalists criticized Borlaug's work, which they claimed led to reliance on a single crop, inequality, malnutrition, and the loss of natural wildlife. While Borlaug recognized some of these claims, he argued that his principle aim was an end to hunger, something, he pointed out, that most of his critics had never experienced. Meanwhile, in the USA and the UK, many smaller farms were trying to return to natural methods, growing many different crops and keeping animals to fertilize the soil. Throughout the 1970s, activists continued to promote a return to more traditional ways of living, and some people were encouraged to try to provide their own food, both out in the countryside and using smaller urban gardens.

与此同时，在世界其他地区，现代方法正在取代传统农业。 在墨西哥、巴基斯坦和印度，诺贝尔奖得主农学家诺曼·博洛格率先使用了新作物和新技术，大大提高了粮食产量。 环保主义者批评博洛格的工作，他们声称这导致了对单一作物的依赖、不平等、营养不良和自然野生动物的丧失。 虽然博洛格承认其中一些说法，但他认为，他的主要目标是结束饥饿，他指出，这是他的大多数批评者从未经历过的。 与此同时，在美国和英国，许多较小的农场正试图回归自然方法，种植许多不同的作物，饲养动物来给土壤施肥。 在整个20世纪70年代，积极分子继续推动回归更传统的生活方式，并鼓励一些人尝试自己提供食物，无论是在农村还是在较小的城市花园。

However, as the idea of organic food became more popular, big business began to move in. The 1980s and 1990s saw the growth of large organic farms and supermarkets, and the importation of organic produce from abroad. At the same time, new legislation in places such as the USA and Europe has made it extremely expensive and complicated for small producers to obtain organic certification. Ironically, many natural local farms are not classed as organic, while much of the organic food supermarkets sell often comes from foreign countries. This has led to criticism from environmentalists who feel that the term organic no longer represents the ideals of organic farming. As we move into the 21st century with a world population of seven billion people, the debate on how we should feed ourselves shows no sign of coming to an end.

然而，随着有机食品的概念越来越受欢迎，大企业开始进入。 20世纪80年代和90年代见证了大型有机农场和超市的增长，以及从国外进口有机农产品。 与此同时，美国和欧洲等地的新法规使小生产者获得有机认证变得极其昂贵和复杂。 具有讽刺意味的是，许多当地的天然农场并没有被归类为有机食品，而超市出售的许多有机食品往往来自国外。 这引起了环保人士的批评，他们认为“有机”一词不再代表有机农业的理想。 随着我们进入21世纪，世界人口达到70亿，关于我们应该如何养活自己的辩论没有任何结束的迹象。