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M: Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. I'm Mike Smith. I feel honored to be invited to the conference. I don't know whether you've heard about the Slow Food Movement before. Now, I'll talk about it.

The Slow Food Movement is really a reaction to fast food and our fast modern lifestyles. People eat too many hamburgers, too many pizzas, and too much fast food in general. The movement itself was started by an Italian called Carlo Petrini. He organized it because a McDonald's had opened near the Spanish Steps in Rome. He felt it was sort of symbolic of the destruction of many valuable traditional things and he tried to promote healthier ways of eating and living.

Some people may think Slow Food just means healthier food. Not exactly. I think it's more about our lifestyles than anything else. We're always in such a hurry. We don't have enough time to take care of ourselves, or enjoy our lives. Fast food companies advertise that their food is healthy as well. It may be right in a way, but for me, and for a lot of Slow Fooders, the problem is that wherever you sit down for a meal, whether it's in Tokyo or Milan, what you're given is too similar. It makes eating and life in general, boring. Traditional food isn't going to be lost completely, but we do want as many people as possible to enjoy it.