2. 外语
  3. In 1798 the political economist Malthus predicted that in time mankind would face starvation, having outgrown the available food

In 1798 the political economist Malthus predicted that in time mankind would face starvation, having outgrown the available food

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问题     In 1798 the political economist Malthus predicted that in time mankind would face starvation, having outgrown the available food supplies. Today, a century and a half later, there are still experts who forecast the same global disaster—unless urgent measures are taken to prevent it.
    By the end of the present century there may well be over five thousand million people living on this globe, an increase of over fifty percent on today’s figure. In order to keep pace with this increase in mankind the farmers of the world will have to step up their production of food by at least two percent every year. Such a rate of increase has never been maintained in any country by conventional methods of agriculture, despite modern mechanization and the widespread use of fertilizers. There are no large worthwhile reserves of potential farmland remaining, and good fertile land is continually being changed into industrial use. Moreover, erosion of the soil takes a constant toll (损失).
    Intensive research, carried out over many years in all manners of climate conditions, has produced a revolutionary method of growing crops without using any soil at all. Hydroponics (水栽 法), as this technique is called, may well be the answer to all our food worries; already it has accomplished wonders in producing huge crops. Hydroponics was once a complicated and expensive business, now it is well out of the experimental stage. Labor costs are far lower than when normal methods of agriculture are employed. In fact, it is a completely automatic system. There is no hard manual work, no digging or ploughing, and no weeding to speak of. Yields can be far higher than they are in soil.
The phrase "having outgrown the available food supplies" in the first paragraph implies that
选项 A、the available food supplies will be enough to feed world population
B、the earth is too exhausted to support its increasing population
C、world population will grow at a rate faster than food production
D、food supplies will be too much available for world population
答案C
解析 本题是一道句子含义类问题。利用查阅式阅读法，找到该句子的上下文。文章第一段指出，早在1798年，政治经济学家马尔萨斯就预言，人类总有一天会由于人数增长超过了可获取的食物资源而面临挨饿的危险。一个半世纪后的今天，仍有专家预测说除非采取紧急措施来阻止这一灾难，否则的话，仍会面临全球性的灾难。由此我们可以推知，本题的正确答案应是C“世界人口增长得比粮食的增长更快”。
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