每日英语一讲,助力四六级——食品保质期真的重要吗?

Do Food Expiration Dates Really Matter?

食品保质期真的重要吗？

When you open your fridge, how often do you check the dates on your food? The yogurt container says it’s still good for a few more days, but the label on the half-used barbecue sauce says it was best before last Sunday. Should you still eat it? The answer is complicated. Dates on food packaging usually indicate when food tastes best, not when it’s unsafe to eat. In the United States, there are roughly 50 variations of date labels, including “use by,” “sell by” and “packaged on,” nearly all of which indicate when quality or freshness begins declining.

当你打开冰箱时，你有多经常会查看食物上的日期？酸奶盒上写着还能再放几天，但那半瓶没吃完的烧烤酱标签上却显示“最佳食用期”已过上周日。你还应该吃它吗？答案并不简单。食品包装上的日期通常表示的是食物在什么时候口感最佳，而不是在什么时候食用不安全。在美国，大约有 50 种不同的日期标签，比如“请在此日期前食用（use by）”“请在此日期前售出（sell by）”和“包装日期（packaged on）”，几乎所有的标签都指示了品质或新鲜度开始下降的时间。

While it’s important to mind the printed dates for some foods, an estimated three billion pounds of food get thrown away each year because of confusion over the date label, according to the food waste nonprofit ReFED. Infant formula is the only product that has standardized, federally regulated date labels, leaving lots of questions about when to toss other aging perishables.

虽然在某些食品上留意标注日期很重要，但据食品浪费公益组织 ReFED 的数据，每年大约有 30 亿磅食物因为对日期标签的误解而被丢弃。婴儿配方奶粉是唯一一种有统一、受联邦监管的日期标签的产品，而对于其他易腐食品该何时丢弃，则存在大量疑问。

In the early to mid-1900s, American households began transitioning from locally grown food toward processed and packaged goods, and some producers began putting dates on their products to ease concerns about freshness. But these labels didn’t become widespread until the 1960s and ’70s, alongside broader efforts to improve nutrition labeling and transparency. Today, individual food companies still determine what date goes on their products. But each uses its own methodology, said Londa Nwadike, a food science professor at South Dakota State University.

在 20 世纪早中期，美国家庭逐渐从食用本地农产品过渡到购买加工和包装食品，一些生产商开始在产品上标注日期，以缓解消费者对新鲜度的担忧。但这些标签直到 20 世纪六七十年代才广泛普及，当时正值改善营养标签和食品透明度的更广泛努力。如今，具体标注什么日期仍由各个食品公司自行决定。不过，每家公司采用的方法各不相同，南达科他州立大学食品科学教授 Londa Nwadike 表示。

文章来源：学习强国

编辑：张 圣

审核：王旭波

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