出版社周刊评论
There's no question where Fox, a veterinarian and long-time Humane Society official, stands on how food is produced in this country. But can he convince the skeptics? In this persuasive illumination of the inner workings of the national food industry, Fox (The Boundless Circle) relies on numbers, and lots of them, rather than shrill rhetoric. For example, he reports that 7000 calves, 130,000 cattle, 360,000 pigs and 24 million chickens are killed every day (the average American consumes 2400 animals in a lifetime). Fox considers food-borne diseases resulting from virtually uninspected slaughtering conditions "as the new plagues," like the 1992-1994 "mad cow" disease in Britain. A year later in the U.S., more than 10 million "diseased, dead, dying, and debilitated cattle" and other consumable animals were "rendered" into other products. Corporations have reduced hands-on family farmers to 2% of the population; one-third of the topsoil of cropland has been lost in the last century, a loss Fox attributes primarily to livestock production; and about 150 million pounds of herbicides are spread on crops annually. Fox stresses that individuals can do something, including simply eating more vegetables; according to the British Medical Journal, "Vegetarians are 40% less likely to die of cancer than meat eaters." Fox also urges consumers to protest federal subsidies for foreign marketing by giant food conglomerates. Anyone who eats will remember this the next time at table as a shivering, cautionary tale. (Dec.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
《书目》(Booklist)书评
Veterinarian Fox says this book was difficult to write. It is also difficult to read, because of the inhumane treatment of animals and the appalling sanitary conditions of meat production and processing Fox reveals, and, primarily, because it opens eyes and provokes thought. Fox examines factory farming, agribusiness, genetic engineering, and aquaculture, raising the question of how to encourage sustainable agriculture. Purchasers, preparers, and eaters have considerable power in promoting conscience as a force in food production and merchandising, for if they don't buy a food, the producers and sellers can't sell it. Fox goes on to show how much has been lost in the shift from the family farm to the gigantic agribusiness spread. But this is not an emotional plea to return, even were that possible, to a previous time. Fox deals in facts, some of them shameful, and in practical methods for increasing personal awareness and personal participation in the movement for humane, sustainable agriculture. --William Beatty
