Food and Politics

 

A look at a possible connection between geopolitics and food trade.

Vocabulary

cook (2)	swot	give
little	piece	advice
make	sure	make sure
swot up	politics	international
before	choose	recipe (2)
because	affect	ingredients
available	see (2)	whenever
row (3)	another	country (2)
often	end	to end up
slap (2)	ban	fall out with
fall	import	for example
government	suddenly	declare
wine	rich (2)	poor (2)
quality	refuse	any
more	less	any more
result	loss	economy
cheese	cheesed off	over (2)
price	trade	link
presto	rather	dodge
dodgy	early	late
latest	feud	dairy products
suspend	again	cite
concern	smell (2)	geopolitics
here	after	all
after all	next	host (2)
summit	aim (2)	forge
close	tie	closer ties
tradition	sphere	traditionally
influence	mad	sphere of influence
by the way	chief (2)	sanitation
inspector	official	seem
announce	claim	nothing
simple	simply	nothing to do
protect	health	citizen
now	should	temporary
normal	back (2)	shelf/shelves
personally	hope	everybody
if	happen	dinner
could	bit (2)	problem

 
 

Video: Food and Politics

 

 
 

Transcript

Now if you like cooking and you’re in Russia, let me give you a little piece of advice: make sure you swot up on international politics before you choose your recipe, because that could affect the ingredients that are available to you.

You see whenever Russia has a political row with another country, it often ends up with Moscow slapping a ban on food imports with a country she’s fallen out with.

For example, when the Russian government fell out with the Georgian government a few years ago, Russia suddenly declared that Georgian wine and Georgian mineral water were of poor quality and refused to import anymore; and that resulted in big losses for the Georgian economy.

Then Russia got cheesed off with Ukraine. It was a row over gas prices, over trade links — and presto: Ukrainian cheese was declared rather dodgy, and banned.

And the latest food-feud is over dairy products from Lithuania. This week Moscow suspended imports, again citing concerns over quality.

But the Lithuanians smelled geopolitics here. After all, next month Lithuania hosts a EU summit aimed at forging closer ties with countries traditionally in Russia’s sphere of influence, like Ukraine and Georgia. Now that’s a recipe that will make Moscow mad.

By the way, this is the man with the bans: Genady Anishenko, Chief sanitary inspector. He’s the official that seems to announce the suspensions. And he claims they have nothing to do with politics, that it’s simply to protect the health of Russian citizens.

Now I should say that these suspensions are normally temporary: Georgian wine and Ukrainian cheese are back on the shelves here.

Personally I hope Russia doesn’t fall out with everybody. Because if that happens, dinner could be a bit of a problem.
 
 

Questions

1. The main idea or theme of this video is Russian cooking. True or false?

2. What often happens with the Russian government has a row (argument, dispute) with another country?

3. What happened with Georgia?

4. Do you think something was wrong with the quality and safety of Georgian wine? Did the ban effect Georgia’s economy? Was this bad for the economy of Georgia?

5. Something similar happened with Ukraine. Yes or no?

6. Why did Moscow suspend dairy products from Ukraine? Did Russia suspend Lithuanian cheese because of molds?

7. Who is Genady Anishenko? Does he say, “We are suspending imports because we have political problems with Georgia (or Ukraine, or Lithuania)?

8. The suspensions or bans are permanent. Is this correct or wrong? Why are the bans temporary?

9. Russia has a brisk international trade in foodstuff. True or false?

10. Name ten things and some activities from the video.
 
 
A. Do you like to cook?

B. My country imports and exports lots of foodstuff. Yes or no? If yes, give examples.

C. What are some foreign foods in your city?

D. Does your country have political disagreements with other countries?
 
 

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