新视野第四册

新视野第四册

考前辅导

考试题型：

Part I Reading comprehension (2x20)

Part II Vocabulary and Structure (1x25)

Part III Cloze (1x20)

Part IV Writing (15)

Passage 1

Questions 1 to 5 are based on the following passage:The key transportation technology for the opening years of the 21st century will be telecommunications. What does telecommunications have to do with international transportation? The obvious linkage is helping ships and aircraft navigate more efficiently, cutting time and operating expenses. This means lower costs of imported goods and cheaper travel for business and pleasure. A less obvious connection is the ability of a clothing manufacturer, for instance, to know the exact location anywhere in the world of materials and finished goods so that inventories (细账) -- and the associated transport, storage, and handling costs——are reduced sharply.

The explosive aspect of the telecommunications/transportation revolution is coming in traditional service industries and functions: technical services, data entry, financial management, software programming, etc. Consider Fidelity Investments of Boston, whose British subsidiary (子公司) sells shares in German companies to German investors by telephone from London. Cheap telecommunications provide the global transportation "highway" for the work that is performed by Fidelity's customer representatives, Irish call center technicians, Indian software engineers, and Jamaican data entry clerks.

These white-collar activities, many of them paying well above average wages, are becoming steadily more important in all economies. Moreover, they now are "contestable" by any country in the world that has a decent telecommunications system and an appropriately skilled labor force.

What this means is that the last major barrier to international trade ——distance—— is being eliminated for an increasing portion of the global economy. Transportation costs no longer will protect inefficient producers. Buyers of goods and services——software, document processing, accounting, tax advice, anything that can be digitized and transported electronically——will have access to suppliers all over the world.

1. In the early years of the 21st century, transportation will especially benefit from ________.

A. cheap telecommunications

B. development of shipping and international air transport

C. international trade

D. skilled labor force

2. The example of Fidelity Investments of Boston shows that ___________.

A. shares can be bought and sold by telephone

B. white-collar workers' wage is more than the average wage

C. distance as the last barrier to international trade is being eliminated

D. white-collar activities are facing the challenges from all over the world

3. In Para. 4, "Transportation costs no longer will protect inefficient producers" probably means that _________.

A. transportation costs will protect efficient producers

B. buyers will no longer turn to inefficient producers for the sake of lower transportation costs

C. inefficient producers will no longer take transportation costs into consideration

D. some producers are inefficient because the transportation costs of their goods are high

4. It can be inferred from the passage that _____________.

A. the price of imported goods will be lower than before

B. white-collar workers are being replaced by computers

C. clothing manufacturers will earn less money

D. global telecommunications will result in the complete

disappearance of distance

5. The passage is mainly about ___________.

A. the development of transportation technology

B. the connection between international transportation and