地球巧克力_地球的救命巧克力

　　巧克力是二月的永恒话题。无论是表达爱意还是奖励自己，巧克力总能带给人甜蜜的幸福感――这不仅是味觉享受，也能让人的精神为之一振。但你是否想过，巧克力还会拥有更伟大的使命呢？不信？一起来看看巧克力如何拯救世界！
　　
　　Many people agree that chocolate is good for the soul, and researchers are finding that chocolate can be good for the body, too. But the environment? How could chocolate help with global climate change?
　　The answer is found in a little piece of 1)paradise, a patch of rainforest in eastern Brazil. Everywhere you look, something is growing. 2)Orchids 3)nestle in the 4)crooks of trees. There are hundreds of shades of green, and the forest is loud with birds and insects.
　　Some areas have been thinned-out and planted with 5)cacao trees � the source of chocolate. The 6)pods
　　contain the magical beans that 7)Aztecs counted like gold. The 8)cultivated cacao trees grow just a bit higher than a man can reach, and rainforest trees tower over them like something out of Dr. Seuss注1 � some round like
　　9)lollipops, some flat like a plate.
　　And here’s the climate connection. Rainforest trees and plants store massive amounts of carbon � keeping it from getting into the air as 10)carbon dioxide.
　　
　　Can Chocolate Help Save the Rainforest?
　　
　　There’s a lot less rainforest than there once was. There used to be 330 million acres of rainforest in eastern Brazil, called the Mata Atlantica注2. Settlers arrived hundreds of years ago and began destroying the forest for the wood, and to create fields for 11)pasture and crops. Only 7% of the Mata Atlantica remains, and destruction is still going on. Every time a tree is burned, its stored carbon is released. As more carbon is released into the air, the planet gets warmer.
　　That worries Dario Ahnert, a plant expert at the State University of Santa Cruz in Eastern Brazil. He says farmers need an 12)incentive to save the remaining forest, and he hopes chocolate will be that incentive.
　　Chocolate used to be a huge industry here, but in the past two decades, plant disease and low prices in the world market for cocoa beans 13)devastated the industry. Farmers turned to other ways of making a living, including
　　14)logging trees or burning the forest for farmland or pasture. When the nutrients in the soil were used up, the land was 15)abandoned.
　　Ahnert wants to persuade farmers to return to chocolate farming and preserve the forest. His friend, Joao Tavares, shows it can be done.
　　
　　Cabruca Farming
　　
　　Joao Tavares is a fourth-generation cocoa producer. Tavares, along with his brother and father, has 2,200 acres of rainforest planted with cacao trees. They grow cocoa using a method called cabruca � cutting down just a few of the tall rainforest trees, and planting the
　　mid-height cacao trees 16)underneath.
　　Inside Tavares’ cabruca forest, the ground is covered in a thick layer of 17)composting leaves. It’s 18)moist, shady and cool here in the cabruca. Football-shaped pods �19)striped in yellow and green and orange and brown �20)jut out from the trunks and branches of the cacao trees.
　　Tavares has worked hard to maintain, and also to restore, his little piece of the rainforest. He says that in the past 10 years, he has planted many wild trees.
　　“We understand that we have to preserve the cabruca,” Tavares says, “even if you have less production.”
　　He gets fewer cacao trees to the acre by planting inside the forest. But he avoids the 21)drawbacks other farmers struggle with when they grow cacao trees on more open land.
　　“You have more production, but you have lots of problems,” Tavares explains. “You have more disease, more insects, so we decide to preserve.”
　　There’s also an expanding market for environ-
　　mentally friendly chocolate. Tavares has been able to get a 22)premium for some of his crop.
　　
　　Carbon Credits for Farmers?
　　
　　Still, his friend, professor Ahnert,
　　admits that cabruca is a tough sell:
　　Farmers want more so-called modern
　　approaches and quicker money. That’s
　　why Ahnert hopes that cabruca can
　　become part of the carbon credit注3 market. Farmers would then get money for preserving forest trees, as well as for their chocolate.
　　“You could increase the income, so I hope some day people that maintain this area are able to get carbon credits,” Ahnert says.
　　The World Agroforestry Center注4 and the
　　chocolate manufacturer Mars Inc. 注5 are currently
　　studying how carbon storage can be measured on
　　cabruca-like farms, and whether a carbon credit system would help farmers � and the environment.
　　
　　Reviving the Land Through Chocolate
　　
　　And there’s an even more 23)ambitious idea out there. Howard Shapiro, chief 24)agronomist at Mars, hopes that chocolate could even bring back a little of the forest paradise that’s been lost, and he’s doing tests with local scientists at Brazil’s national chocolate research institute.
　　After the forest disappeared, the soil became hard and 25)compact, like yellow 26)cement. Only weeds grew in it. Shapiro and his colleagues asked local
　　farmers what sort of plants they would like, both 27)in the long run and while they wait for the soil to become rich enough to support cacao trees.
　　“What we decided to do was, we would begin with annual crops,” Shapiro explains. “Corn, beans � things that have a cash crop value �28)melons, 29)squashes, and begin to establish bananas for shade, then start to plant cacao.”
　　They also planted rubber trees, and heliconium flowers. The first plants went in seven years ago. Now it’s easy to grab a handful of soil. It’s dark brown, moist and 30)crumbly, like devil’s food cake注6 � with worms. But the worms are good for the soil.
　　“See all the little flowers on this tree?” Shapiro asks, pointing to a cacao tree. “All those little pink buds. … It’s healthy. These trees are healthy.”
　　Shapiro wants to work out the details, but he’s ready to say the project is a success. “We learned that you could take totally abandoned land, and you could restore it to 31)profitability after about three years,” he says.
　　So, will preserving, and even replanting, some of this forest in eastern Brazil fix the Earth’s climate problem? No. But in this little corner of the world, it may help. And at least we’ll have more chocolate.
　　
　　
　　
　　很多人都赞成巧克力是裨益心灵的佳品。研究人员也发现，巧克力对身体好处多多。可是对环境呢？巧克力如何改善全球气候变化呢？
　　我们在一方小小的人间天堂――巴西东部的一片热带雨林里找到了答案。在这里，你目光所及之处皆有生物生长。兰花娇弱地依偎在弯曲的树木枝干上。这里有成百上千片绿荫，雨林里鸟鸣虫叫，充满了生命的喧闹声。
　　一些地方的雨林已渐稀疏，种上了可可树――巧克力的原料。荚果中含有被阿兹特克人视为“黄金”的神奇可可豆。这里种植的可可树只比成人可以触及之处稍高。而雨林树木高耸入天，使之相形见绌。就像苏伊斯博士书中的情景――有的圆似棒棒糖，有的平似
　　大盘子。
　　这就显现出热带雨林和气候的联系。热带雨林的树木和植物存储了大量的碳元素，可以阻止它们散逸到大气里变成二氧化碳。
　　
　　巧克力有助拯救热带雨林？
　　
　　现存的热带雨林比过去要少得多。过去，巴西东部的热带雨林面积曾达三亿三千万英亩，被称为（巴西）大西洋沿海森林区。几百年前，定居者到来，开始破坏雨林。他们砍伐树木，开辟田地用于放牧和种植庄稼。此区只有7%的热带雨林存活下来，而破坏仍在继续。每当树木被焚毁，它所储存的碳元素就会被释放出来。越多的碳元素被释放到大气中，地球的温室效应越趋恶化。
　　这一现象引起了巴西东部圣克鲁斯州立大学的植物专家达里奥・阿奈特的担忧。他说农民需要一种激励机制，以鼓励他们拯救仅存的雨林。他希望巧克力可以成为这种激励因素。
　　这里曾经有过庞大的巧克力产业，然而，在过去的二十年里，植物病害和世界市场上可可豆的低廉价格摧毁了这个产业。农民们转而寻求其它谋生手段，包括伐木或焚烧雨林用作农田放牧等。当一块土地里的营养被（庄稼）吸收殆尽，它就会被弃之不用。
　　阿奈特希望说服农民们回归巧克力种植业，以保护热带雨林。通过其朋友裘奥・塔瓦热斯的验证，这种策略是切实可行的。
　　
　　Cabruca式种植
　　
　　裘奥・塔瓦热斯家祖传四代都从事可可种植业。塔瓦热斯连同其父兄一共拥有2200英亩种有可可树的热带雨林。他们使用一种叫做cabruca的方法种可可，即只砍掉几棵高大的热带雨林树木，在它们的树冠下种植中等高度的可可树。
　　在塔瓦热斯的cabruca式雨林里，土地上覆盖着厚厚一层堆积肥料的落叶。cabruca环境潮湿荫蔽，凉爽怡人。足球形状的豆荚――夹杂着黄、绿、橙和棕色的条纹――从可可树的树干和枝条上垂下来。
　　塔瓦热斯为保有和恢复他那一小块热带雨林而努力工作。在过去十年里，他种下了很多野生树木。
　　“我们意识到我们必须保持这种cabruca式种植，”塔瓦热斯说。“即使这种方法会让我的产量相对少些。”
　　由于可可树种在雨林里，土地上种植树木数量少了。但他避开了其他农民在更开阔的土地上种可可树会面临的弊端。
　　“你确实可以得到更大产量，但这也会带来很多问题。”塔瓦热斯解释道。“那样的种植会带来更多虫害，所以我们还是决定保护这些土地。”
　　环保型巧克力的市场也在不断扩大。因此，塔瓦热斯的部分可可豆可以卖出高额
　　溢价。
　　
　　给农民碳信用奖励？
　　
　　不过，他的朋友阿奈特教授承认，农民对用cabruca法种植可可的想法不大买账：农民们想用更多所谓的现代化耕种方法，用更快的速度获得金钱。这就是为什么阿奈特希望cabruca式种植能够成为碳信用额度市场的一部分――农民通过巧克力赚钱的同时，也可以通过保护雨林获得金钱回报。
　　“你可以（通过保护雨林）增加收入，所以我希望有朝一日，保护这片地区的人们可以得到一些碳信用额度（从而增加收入），”阿奈特说。
　　世界农林学中心和巧克力制造商玛氏有限公司正在研究如何在cabruca型农场测量碳储存水平，碳信用系统是否可以帮助农民增加收入，以及这是否也有助于保护环境。
　　
　　巧克力救土地
　　
　　不仅如此，人们还有更远大的目标。玛氏公司的首席农艺师霍华德・沙皮罗希望巧克力甚至可以挽救一小部分已经失去的雨林天堂――他正和巴西当地的国家巧克力研究所的科学家们进行研究测试。
　　在雨林消失以后，土壤变得坚硬致密，就像黄水泥一样，只有杂草能在上面生长。沙皮罗和他的同事向当地农民打听，从长远上看他们喜欢种什么作物，以及在等待土壤变肥沃直至支持可可树生长的期间，喜欢种什么植物。
　　“我们决定先种那些一年一熟的作物。”沙皮罗解释说。“农作物、豆类等具有经济价值的植物，还有甜瓜、南瓜等，我们开始种香蕉树来遮荫，然后着手种植可可树。”
　　他们还种了橡胶树和heliconium花。第一批植物是七年前种上去的。现在，你很容易就可以抓起一捧土壤。土壤色泽暗褐，湿润疏松，就像恶魔蛋糕――上面还有一些虫子。不过，这些虫子对于土壤很有好处。
　　“看到这棵树上的小花吗？”沙皮罗指着一棵可可树问，“所有小小的粉色花蕾……它很健康。这些树都很健康。”
　　沙皮罗想深入更多具体的细节，不过他认为这个项目（已经）成功了。“我们发现你可以拿一块完全废弃的土地，然后用大约三年的时间让它重现生机。”
　　那么，保护甚至是重建巴西东部的部分雨林就可以解决整个地球的气候问题吗？答案当然是否定的。不过在这个小小的角落，它可能带来很大益处。至少，我们有更多巧克力吃了。