AlGore Global Warming

Task 13. You are going to watchthe video presentation on What’s wrong about our food system. Before watching practice the vocabulary you will need for comprehension and read the questions to find the answers in the presentation.

Vocabulary drills:

 

13.1 Choose the correct answer, write the collocation to each of the new words and try to memorise them:

1. If the cows are grazing in the field they are

a) eating grass;

b) flying in the sky;

c) drinking water;

d) jumping over the hedge.

2. We use the word ‘stuff’ to mean

a) all people who work together at one place;

b) all things collectively;

c) all farm animals;

d) fruits.

3. When we look into the issue we

a) search for it;

b) entertain people with it;

c) demonstrate our point;

d) study it.

4. The word creepy describes something

a) bright and pleasant;

b) strange or unnatural and making you feel frightened;

c) positive and useful;

d) beautiful.

5. Fossil fuels are

a) synthetic oils;

b) natural oils from fruits;

c) natural oils from vegetables;

d) formed underground from plant and animal remains millions of years ago.

6. A person is called a lunatic if he/she

a) behaves in a silly or dangerous way;

b) behaves properly;

c) doesn’t know what to do;

d) plays in the moon light.

7. In a grocery store we buy

a) clothes;

b) computers;

c) food;

d) vegetables.

 

 

13.2 Match the words to their definitions; use them in the sentences of your own:

1. liver	a. a very small insect
2. kidneys	b. the quality of being poisonous
3. toxicity	c. enclosed or restricted; limited
4. inflammation	d. to expose (food) to electromagnetic radiation to kill bacteria and slow down deterioration
5. lesion	e. a large organ in the body which cleans the blood and produces bile
6. confined	f. a red, painful and often swollen area in or on a part of your body
7. weed	g. damage to the skin or part of the body caused by injury or by illness
8. bug	h. a pair of small organs in the body which take away waste matter from the blood to produce urine
9. to irradiate	i. a wild plant growing where it is not wanted, especially among crops or garden plants

13.3 Read the following questions and find the answers to them while watching the video:

1. What did Birke use to think?

2. What did he discover about industrialised food system?

3. What does abbreviation CAFO stand for?

4. Why do conventional farmers use chemical fertilisers?

5. Which chemicals are sprayed on fruits and vegetables? Why?

6. How does Birke explain poisoning our water by those chemicals?

7. Why is food irradiated?

8. How can Birke change the situation?

9. Why do they call Joel Salatin a lunatic farmer?

10. Why does Birke think that more expensive organic food from local farmers is not as expensive as it may seem?

11. How does he think it possible to make people aware of this all?

12. If you want to make difference what should you do?

Using the talks and lectures you listened to and watched in this chapter as models prepare a mini-talk (1 – 2 minutes) on the following issue. Use as many words and expressions from the topical vocabulary you have studied above as possible:

Why do environmentalists say we should avoid spray cans, practise organic farming and use unleaded petrol, recycled paper and bottle banks? What else are they in favour of and why?