Food knowledge in danger of extinction

To Chinese the food culture is crucial. It has existed for centuries and has an important place in their daily life. Nevertheless Chinese have never taken a real interest into the origin of their food. South China Morning Post  quotes Ling Kuang Sung saying “Until recently the Chinese didn’t really think about their food and where it was coming from, which is absurd given how important food is to us culturally and the way we consider food to be medicine. But given that the Chinese have endured hunger from the late 19th century until just about 20 years ago, the focus has understandably been just on getting food on the table.”

Therefore Ling Kuang Sung participated to the Slow Food festival that is hold every two years in Turin. It’s main goal is to promote and to contribute to the preservation of culinary biodiversity especially those species facing extinction. In total 7,000 delegates from 143 countries attended the event to present their country’s most interesting and underrated natural foods. China presented with many gourmet chefs about 60 food product from different region of the country. Each of these preparation is already registered in the Chinese food catalogue named Ark of Taste. All the products registered in it are endangered foods that risk disappearing if knowledge is not passed on.

Ling Kuang Sung, one of the three founders of Slow Food Great China in 2015 has been since the late 1990s an active promotor of safe and ethically grown artisan food. He attended the event to encourage internationally China’s rise of food consciousness. Especially for the middle and nouveaux riches are increasingly curious about their food’s origin. They also become more concerned about health and environment issues, particularly since the heavy pollutions issues this country has faced.