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  3. Environmental movement is stronger than ever but seems to be fighting a losing battle. Despite a record flow of financial resour

Environmental movement is stronger than ever but seems to be fighting a losing battle. Despite a record flow of financial resour

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问题     Environmental movement is stronger than ever but seems to be fighting a losing battle. Despite a record flow of financial resources, the planet’s most serious challenges—global warming, loss of biodiversity, marine depletion—remain as intractable as ever, making environmentalists vulnerable to charges that green groups have prospered while the earth has not. Of course, the issues are complicated and could require decades and trillions of dollars to resolve. Part of the problem is that it’s easier to protest, to hurl venom at practices you don’t like, than to find new ways to do business and create change. So it’s time to look at the past tactics of many green groups and identify lessons to be learned.
    Environmentalists who have been bashing "evil" corporations for years have found themselves with plenty of allies. But the planet needs profitable, innovative businesses even more than it needs environmentalists. After all it is companies, not advocacy groups, that will create the technologies needed to save the environment. When conservation purity is the only acceptable option, the biggest polluters will have no incentive to clean up their acts. Says Dwight Evans, executive vice president of Southern Co., a major U.S. energy producer, "If tomorrow we announced we were shutting down 25% of our plants to put in new high-tech devices, the headline would be, WHY NOT THE OTHER 75%? We don’t get credit for what we’ve done, or for what we’re going to do. " So how to turn corporations into partners in preservation? For starters, when companies make efforts to turn green, environmentalists shouldn’t jump down their throats the minute they see any backsliding.
    When environmentalists and some industries are involved in a war, a simple truism applies: It is better to negotiate a surrender with industries than to fight to the death for a losing cause. Though environmentalists may be loath to admit it, this is their choice in the battle over genetically modified foods. Despite the best attempts by European activists to seal off the Continent from such foods, the new science of farming is here to stay. What could be better for the environment than a cheap, simple way for farmers to double or triple their output while using fewer pesticides on less land? Of course it’s possible that some genetically modified foods may carry health risks to humans, and it’s unclear whether agricultural companies will be able to control where their altered-gene products end up. But what’s needed now are not crop tramplers and lab burners but powerful lobbyists able to negotiate for more effective safeguards and a greater humanitarian use of the technology.
How should environmentalists respond to genetically modified foods according to the passage?
选项 A、They should take a more optimistic attitude toward this new bioengineering technology.
B、They should help bioengineers to control where the altered-gene products end up.
C、They should negotiate for regulations to ensure safety of the technology.
D、They should remind the bioengineers of the potential health risks of the technology.
答案C
解析 根据本文内容，环保主义者应当如何回应转基因食品?[A]他们应当对这一新的生物工程技术抱以更乐观的态度。[B]他们应当帮助生物工程学家控制转基因食品的发展方向。[C]他们应当和监管部门谈判制定法规，以保证这项技术的安全性。[D]他们应当提醒生物工程学家这项技术的潜在健康风险。文章最后一句指出，我们现在需要的是强有力的游说者，让他们去谈判以求找到更有效的保护措施，使对转基因技术的利用更人性化。[C]正好与此相吻合，是正确答案。
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