2. 外语
  3. World Trade Organization Director-general Renato Ruggiero predicted that the WTO would boost global incomes by $ 1 trillion in t

World Trade Organization Director-general Renato Ruggiero predicted that the WTO would boost global incomes by $ 1 trillion in t

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问题     World Trade Organization Director-general Renato Ruggiero predicted that the WTO would boost global incomes by $ 1 trillion in the next ten years. The pact paves the way for more foreign investment and competition in telecom markets. Many governments are making telecom deregulation a priority and making it easier for outsiders to enter the telecommunication business.
    The pace varies widely. The U. S. and Britain are well ahead of the pack, while Thailand won’t be fully open until 2006. Only 20% of the $ 601 billion world market is currently open to competition. That should jump to about 75% in a couple of years—largely due to the Telecom Act in the U. S. last year that deregulated local markets, the opening up of the European Union’s markets from Jan. 1, 1998 and the deregulation in Japan. The WTO deal now provides a forum for the inevitable disputes along the way. It is also symbolic: the first major trade agreement of the post-industrial age. Instead of being obsessed with textile quotas, the WTO pact is proof that governments are realizing that in an information age, telecom is the oil and steel of economies in the future. Businesses around the world are already spending more in total on telecom services than they do on oil.
    Consumers, meanwhile, can look forward to a future of lower prices—by some estimates, international calling rates should drop 80% over several years—and better service. Thanks in part to the vastly increased call volume carded by the fiber-optic cables that span the globe today, calling half a world away already costs little more than telephoning next door. The monopolies can no longer set high prices for international calls in many countries. In the U. S. , the world’s most fiercely competitive long distance market, frequent callers since last year have been paying about 12 cents a minute to call Britain, a price not much more than domestic rates.
    The new competitive environment on the horizon means more opportunities for companies from the U. S. and U. K. in particular because they have plenty of practice at the rough-and-tumble of free markets. The U. S. lobbied hard for the WTO deal, confident that its firms would be big beneficiaries of more open markets. Britain has been deregulated since 1984 but will see even more competition than before: in December, the government issued 45 new international licenses to join British Telecom so that it will become a strong competitor in the international market. However, the once-cosseted industry will get rougher worldwide. Returns on capital will come down. Risks will go up. That is how free markets work. It will look like any other business.
The tone of this passage can be described as______.
选项 A、informative and neutral
B、serious and cautious
C、enthusiastic and optimistic
D、analytical and worried
答案D
解析 主旨题。文章第一段描述了WTO对电信市场的影响，第二段分析了WTO如何对电信市场产生影响，第三段分析了WTO影响电信市场会给消费者带来什么，第四段则分析了竞争的存在和作者所担心的风险。因此可推断出，作者有分析也有担忧。故正确答案为D。
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