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It was seen as the mark of civilized eating, and distinguished well-fed French workers from the English, who wolf down prawn san

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问题     It was seen as the mark of civilized eating, and distinguished well-fed French workers from the English, who wolf down prawn sandwiches at their desks. However, France’s tradition of the three-course restaurant lunch is in danger of being killed off by the economic crisis. Around 3,000 traditional French restaurants, cafes and bars went bust in the first three months of 2008 and unions predict a further rush of closures as people worry about making ends meet. The number of French restaurants going bankrupt rose by 25% from last year, and cafes forced to close were up by 56%.

    Le Figaro’s renowned restaurant critic, Francois Simon, said that French consumers’ frugality had changed national eating habits and forced restaurant owners to the brink. Diners were now skipping the traditional aperitif, avoiding starters, drinking tap water, passing on wine and coffee and sharing puddings.
    Even the city’s smartest restaurants are getting impatient with smaller orders. In one restaurant near Paris’ Care de Lyon, he reported, two couples were asked to leave by a desperate restaurant owner because they would not order starters. The restaurant chain Hippopotamus is now running loyalty deals and special-offer hamburgers, which have become more popular than French steak dishes. Office workers are increasingly buying take-away baguettes and supermarket lunches.
    Making ends meet with low salaries and rising food prices has become a national obsession as France’s economy continues to be sluggish, regular TV reports describe the desperation of people forced to eat cheap tinned vegetables or forage in bins at markets. The restaurant sector has seen the third highest number of bankruptcies in France this year, after the construction and building trades, according to the credit insurance group Euler Hermes SFAC.
    The time French people spend on eating meals in restaurants has already gone down: in 1975, a lunch out took an average of one and a half hours. By 2005, this had fallen to 32 minutes. Daniele Deleval, vice president of the UMIH restaurant and hotel union, said, "We’re very worried. Since the start of the year, the number of restaurant customers has dropped, on average, 20% , and we’re seeing no signs of improvement. "
    Jean Guillaume, owner of Le Bouquet brasserie on Boulevard Haussmann in Paris’ smart 8th district, said, "Lunch customers used to order a main course, dessert, coffee and a bottle of wine. Now they’re limiting themselves to a main course, tap water, and giving up the rest. Of 75 customers in this lunchtime, none had a bottle of wine. It’s the end of a tradition of lunching out and it looks like figures will stay this low for two to three years. " The nearby bakery, however, was busy selling take-away baguettes, with queues down the street at midday.

    Restaurant and bar owners are reeling from a poor summer with fewer international tourists visiting Paris, especially Americans and Japanese. And in Toulouse, cafe owners complained that customers would try. to make one drink last as long as possible. Even in French holiday destinations, like Arcachon in the west or the cote d’Azur in the south, restaurant owners said business was down by at least 10%.
What is causing the number of people dining in restaurants to decrease?
选项
答案The economic crisis.
解析
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本试题收录于： A类竞赛（研究生）题库大学生英语竞赛（NECCS）分类
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