I've been reading this sci-fi novel.It's awesome.But there are some parts which i don't understand.Please help me with it!Thanks a lot!
Here's the quotation:

"A few people stop to examine Anderson's purchase, but even if Anderson thinks the price is low, they apparently find it too expensive and pass on.
The woman hands across the ngaw, and Anderson almost laughs with pleasure. Not a single one of these furry fruits should exist; he might as well be hefting a sack of trilobites. If his guess about the ngaw's origin is correct, it represents a return from extinction as shocking as if a Tyrannosaurus were stalking down Thanon Sukhumvit. But then, the same is true of the potatoes and tomatoes and chiles that fill the market, all piled in such splendid abundance, an array of fecund nightshades that no one has seen in generations. In this drowning city, all things seem possible. Fruits and vegetables return from the grave, extinct flowers blossom on the avenues, and behind it all, the Environment Ministry works magic with the genetic material of generations lost."

1、 Have "these potatoes and tomatoes and chiles,an array of fecund nightshades" already returned? Or just the charcter is picturing that these fruits would return someday?

2、I can't figure out what does "and behind it all, the Environment Ministry.....lost" mean.

Last edited by vincenthsu; 08/24/11 01:32 PM.