BRICS (金砖国家) grouping major emerging (新兴的) economies of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa is to more than double its members with the admission of six more countries This historic expansion, which was announce data press conference during the 15th BRICS Summit in Johannesburg, South Africa, involves Argentina, Egyptl, Ethiopia, Iran, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, and their membership will take effect from Jan 1.2024.
Observers said that the expansion bears witness to BRICS’ charm and vitality, helps improve the voices of the Global South, and mirrors the resolve of the group and the wider developing world to safeguard global equity (公平) and justice and promote peace and development.
Seventeen years since its establishment, BRICS has witnessed fruitful cooperation results in economic, political and cultural areas, and continues to prosper in a spirit of openness, inclusiveness and win-win cooperation. The BRICS countries have written a wonderful story of the joint development of countries with different systems, cultures and regions, which has become a flagship of South-South cooperation.
Experts believe the expansion will represent a historic and new starting point for BRICS cooperation.
Mohammad Jamshidi, the Iranian president’s deputy chief of staff for political affairs, posted his celebrations to Iran’s accession to BRICS, calling it a “historic move”.
BRICS’ expansion in a well-studied manner “would increase its strength and effectiveness and improve its regional and international role, in a way that contributes.to achieving greater and faster development rates,” said Abdel-Sattar Eshrah, secretary-general of the Cairo-based Egyptian-Chinese Business Council. “It would create many opportunities for joint cooperation among BRICS members in various fields,” the Egyptian business leader said, adding that BRICS’ expansion is to increase the abilities of its members to address economic, financial and political crises and challenges.
Filipe Porto, a researcher at the Federal University of ABC and a member of the Brazilian Foreign Policy Observatory, said although the five founding member states have very different national conditions, the spirit of win-win cooperation has kept the BRICS mechanism (机制) dynamic and drawn interest from more countries.
The rise of emerging economies, represented by BRICS nations, is fundamentally changing the global landscape. With the historic expansion, the BRICS inechanism will have a greater voice in driving global governance reforms toward a more just an id equitable direction, filling the world with greater certainty and stability, said experts.
1. Which of the following can replace the underlined word “resolve” in paragraph 2?| A．Limitation. | B．Freedom. | C．Determination. | D．Appointment. |
| A．The benefits BRICKS has brought. |
| B．The management of BRICKS. |
| C．The regulations of BRICKS. |
| D．The founding of BRICKS. |
| A．Exhibiting strong leadership skills, |
| B．Creating win-win opportunities, |
| C．Driving global governance reforms. |
| D．Making the world have greater stability. |
| A．Why BRICS is recovering |
| B．History of BRICKS’ development |
| C．BRICS grouping major emerging economies |
| D．BRICS shines brighter after historic expansion |
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【推荐1】The words “protect animals” appear everywhere in books and on screens since some animals are in danger of dying out. But sometimes the reality can be a little different from what people read or watch.
About 300 black bears were killed in Florida, the US, in October, 2015. It’s been the first bear hunt since 1994.
Animal protection groups were against this decision. But local officials explained that the black bear population had grown to 3,500 and become a menace to local people. In the past two years, bears have hurt at least four people in Florida.
This brings an old question back into the spotlight — which is more important, protecting animals or protecting people’s interests(利益)?
This question is asked in other countries too. In Switzerland, a wolf was sentenced to death by the Swiss government months ago. This is because the wolf killed 38 sheep and local people lost a lot of money. Days ago in China, three old men were arrested for killing a serow (鬣羚), a protected species. But they insisted they didn’t know about this and killed the animal because it ruined their crops.
However, these stories don’t always mean that animal protection stops due to human interests, especially involving economic development. A man named Zhou Weisen set up a wild animal base in Guilin, Guangxi. He saved over 170 tigers and 300 bears. But his base also offered jobs to local people.
“There may never be a standard answer to the question of whether we should give more attention to the environment or human development,” said Robert May, a British biologist at Oxford University. “But we shouldn’t push either one to the side, as the future is hanging in the balance.”
1. In October 2015, Florida held its first bear hunt after about________.| A．five years | B．ten years |
| C．fourteen years | D．twenty-one years |
| A．Danger. | B．Chance. |
| C．Relief. | D．Treasure. |
| A．Protecting animals needs hard work. |
| B．Zhou was good at feeding wild animals. |
| C．Zhou had a good relationship with local people. |
| D．Protecting animals can bring economic development. |
| A．Human development should be considered first. |
| B．We should pay more attention to animal protection. |
| C．We should consider both the environment and human interests. |
| D．It’s difficult to find proper ways to solve environmental problems. |
| A．Because the wolf killed 38 sheep |
| B．Because local people lost a lot of money |
| C．Because the wolf are dangerous |
| D．Both A&B |
【推荐2】We all know that men and women have their differences. But do they really think differently?
Women, on the other hand, are usually very good at doing several jobs at once.
Men and women seem to think differently too. Women usually score higher in writing tests. Men are seven times more likely to score in the top 5% in scientific exams. They’re often talented at problem-solving and making quick decisions.
| A．Women, by contrast, are good at organizing, comforting and giving advice. |
| B．It is true, nevertheless, that men and women often respond differently to the same situation. |
| C．Some people might argue that they don’t, but I disagree. |
| D．They also need far more time to complete tasks that require strength or stamina (耐力) . |
| E．In today’s society, where the sexes are considered to be equal, we sometimes forget how different we are. |
| F．This can also be explained by history, I believe. |
| G．This might explain why it’s so difficult to have a conversation with a man when he’s watching TV. |
【推荐3】Which comes first, happiness or money? Are richer people happier? And if so, how do people get much richer? A recent study could tell you the answer.
The study looked into thousands of teenagers and found that those who felt better about life as young adults tended to have higher incomes by the time they turned 29. Those who were happiest earned an average of $8, 000 more than those who were the most depressed.
The researchers, from University College London and the University of Warwick, say that very gloomy teens, no matter how tall or smart they were, earned 10% less than their peers, while the happier ones earned up to 30% more.
Happier teenagers have an easier time getting through school, college and a job interview, chiefly because they always feel better about life. It may also be true that happier people find it easier to make friends, who are often the key to homework help or networking.
A report in June suggested that professional respect was more important than dollars in terms of workplace happiness. In August scientists announced that they had found the gene for happiness in women, Alas (the same gene doesn't appear to have the same effect on men). And in October researchers in the UK and in the US announced that people who eat seven portions of fruit and vegetables a day report being the happiest.
The big question is: if it really is true that happier kids end up being wealthier kids, is it necessary for parents to get their kids to do the homework? The fact is that no homework will make kids happy but surely hurt their grades. Studies do show, after all, that more education leads to better-paid jobs, which may give us a deep thought.
"These findings show that the teenagers’ happiness is important to their future success," one of the report's authors writes. "But what is the most important is that we should find a way to help children gain more satisfaction from doing schoolwork."
1. What conclusion can the researchers draw from the recent study?| A．Happy teenagers grow up to be wealthier. |
| B．Money can make people become happier. |
| C．Wealth has nothing to do with happiness at all. |
| D．Schoolwork can help teens achieve success. |
| A．they are easy to communicate with others |
| B．they are good at doing their schoolwork |
| C．they are hopeful and optimistic about their life |
| D．they eat much more fruit and vegetables a day |
| A．upset | B．glorious |
| C．happy | D．wealthy |
| A．The way to educate kids | B．The source of happiness |
| C．How to achieve your goal | D．The secret of being wealthier |
From: Mavis Chen
Subject: getting back our old subscribers
Since the marketing meeting yesterday, it occurred to me that we might be ignoring one potentially important source of subscribers. We have focused so intently on how to expand the appeal of our product to groups that have never used it before that I’m afraid we may have overlooked the obvious； we may have forgotten that there is a whole group of interested people who have used it and stopped for one reason or another.
This target group has particularly good potential because it consists of readers who have demonstrated interest in the subject matter we present. Their interest is not something we have to work to stimulate. I suggest that making a maximum effort to win these readers back will be more effective on a percentage basis than pursuing some of the other groups we’ve identified.
Since these readers quit using our product once, they were most likely dissatisfied with some aspect of our presentation or our pricing. Our new product will be vastly improved over the old version and is priced more competitively. We need to do everything possible to get those points across, perhaps by sending them a free issue and by asking for their opinions on how we might improve it even further. This could be in the form of a very short survey, either included with the free issue or accessible online.
If you think this idea has merit and might be willing to authorize it, let’s discuss it further when you’ve got a few spare minutes. I have a rough draft of the survey questions I could show you.
1. What kind of product is the writer referring to in the memo?| A．A web-based information service. | B．A magazine. |
| C．A consulting service. | D．Computer software. |
| A．Their product has no competition. |
| B．Their product has changed dramatically. |
| C．They have reduced the price of their product |
| D．The need for their product has increased. |
| A．Start her plan immediately. | B．Wait for input from the survey. |
| C．Get Mr. Rodgers’ approval. | D．Present her idea in the next meeting. |
【推荐2】When it comes to eating, more and more Americans are ordering online instead of eating out. In some restaurants, cooks make food for other online restaurants at the same time. Online orders are only 5% of all restaurants orders, but they are growing about 20% each year.
The increase in online ordering in the US has created openings for new kinds of businesses. One is called Kitchen United. It builds kitchens for restaurants that want to enter take-out markets. Chick-Fil-A, The Halal Guys and Dog Haus all have opened kitchens through it. Another company, DoorDash, sends food to customers who order online. Fuad Hannon is the head of new business at DoorDash, He says, “The industry is still young. It may be too soon to know how it will grow, but what we know is that people love to get their favorite food sent.”
Two other businesses, Grubhub and Uber Eats, say their virtual (虚拟的) restaurant programs help small businesses compete. Both reach out to restaurant owners with suggestions for online. restaurants based on data from customer searches. This information helps owners. think about everything from how people get their food to what should go on the menu.
Kristen Adamowski heads Uber Eats. She says they have helped start 4,000 virtual restaurants worldwide, about half of them in the US and Canada.
Virtual restaurants have the benefit of testing new ideas without taking on expensive rents or employing more workers like traditional ones. But small restaurants should look at the risks before starting an online restaurant suggested by third-party app businesses. Those businesses offer no training for kitchen' workers to get used to making new foods. Other things to consider: whether their delivery containers are right for new dishes, or whether they want to increase their dependence on outside delivery drivers. Those are not small or easy things.
1. What can we learn about online food orders in the US from paragraph 1?| A．They’ve replaced traditional restaurant orders. |
| B．They take up only 20% of restaurant orders. |
| C．They’ve taken up most of the market, |
| D．They are rapidly increasing yearly. |
| A．Its customers are young. |
| B．It will surely develop well. |
| C．Its future remains to be seen. |
| D．It will help people build more restaurants. |
| A．Uber Eats. | B．Dog Haus. | C．Chick-Fi1-A. | D．DoorDash. |
| A．Better late than never. |
| B．Think carefully before you act. |
| C．Failure is the mother of success. |
| D．Where there is a will, there is a way. |
【推荐3】Have you ever lost your direction? Then you might find satellite navigation(satnav) systems(卫星定位系统) helpful.
A satnav system uses groups of satellites. They send information to a receiver(接收器), such as your smartphone. Then they can find where you are.
The earliest satnav system is the Global Positioning System(GPS) of the United States. The US has put 24 satellites into space to make sure GPS can locate(定位) a person correctly and globally. Likewise, Russia’s GLONASS and European Union’s Galileo can also work globally.
But China is catching up, building its own BeiDou Navigation Satellite System. BeiDou is China’s homegrown satnav system, reported Xinhua. It was set up in 2000, when China sent BeiDou’s first navigation experiment satellite into space. With it, China became the third country to build a satnav system after the US and Russia.
BeiDou can find you wherever you are. It helps you go faster by finding shortcuts(捷径) and using correct directions. When you are in trouble and call the police, they will know exactly where you are if you have a cellphone that uses BeiDou.
Today, there are more than 20 BeiDou satellites above our heads. And the system is able to offer open services to the Asia-Pacific region(亚太地区).
In November, China plans to send more BeiDou-3 satellites into space. BeiDou-3’s position accuracy(准确度) is less than five meters, Ran Chengqi, a senior designer of the satellite navigation system, told China Daily.
By 2020, BeiDou is planned to have 35 satellites and begin serving globally, reported Xinhua.
1. A satnav system works correctly and globally by using .| A．a satellite | B．a group of satellites |
| C．a receiver like a smartphone | D．a group of receivers |
| A．7 | B．24 |
| C．20 | D．35 |
| A．The United States | B．South Korea |
| C．Russia | D．China |
| A．There are 35 BeiDou satellites above our heads |
| B．BeiDou now is able to Serve globally |
| C．BeiDou satellites are made in China |
| D．Everyone needs to have a cellphone that can use BeiDou |
【推荐1】Stephen Hawking, the most famous physicist of his time, has passed away at the age of 76.
Hawking was known worldwide for working to explain subjects like the beginnings of the universe and the complexities of black holes. He was diagnosed with a disease called amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or ALS, at age 21. At the time, doctors predicted he would only live a few years. But he proved them wrong by surviving for more than 50 years more and continuing his scientific work.
In his 2013 book, My Brief History, Hawking wrote about first learning of the illness: “I felt it was very unfair—why should this happen to me?” He added, “At the time, I thought my life was over and that I would never realise the potential I felt I had.” “But now, 50 years later, I can be quite satisfied admired with my life,” he wrote.
A sign of his being came in October 2017, when Cambridge put Hawking’s 1966 thesis on the internet for the first time. Demand for the thesis was so high that it caused the university’s website to go down.
Hawking said belief in a God who intervenes in the universe “to make sure the good guys win or get rewarded in the next life” was wishful thinking. “But one can’t help asking the question: Why does the universe exist?” he said in 1991. “I don’t know an operational way to give the question or the answer, if there is one, a meaning. But it bothers me.”
Hawking was a big supporter of human space travel to the Moon and Mars. He said such missions would help unite humanity in a shared purpose of spreading the human race beyond Earth. “We are running out of space and the only places to go to are other worlds. It is time to explore other solar systems. Spreading out may be the only thing that saves us from ourselves. I am convinced that humans need to leave the Earth,” he said last year.
1. What is Hawking’s attitude towards life when just diagnosed with ALS?| A．Optimistic. | B．Hope. | C．Disappointed. | D．Confident. |
| A．The beginning of the universe. | B．The intervene of god in the universe. |
| C．The rewards that good people get in the next life. | D．The crash of the Internet. |
| A．We have used up all the space. | B．We have explored the Moon and Mars for a long time. |
| C．It can help spread the human race beyond Earth. | D．It is a way to save the Earth. |
| A．Stephen Hawking Is Recognized for His Research on Black Holes |
| B．Stephen Hawking Supports Human Space Travels |
| C．Stephen Hawking Is a Worldwide Famous Physicist |
| D．Famous Physicist Stephen Hawking Died at 76 |
【推荐2】For the first time in about 100 years, a rare bird called the takahē is walking freely along the Lake Whakatipu Waimaori Valley in New Zealand after 18 captive birds were released into the wild. The area is also home to a Maori tribe called Ngai Tahu, which has spent years campaigning for the birds to return to their land. The Maori are New Zealand’s Indigenous people (first people known to live there), and they consider the takahē bird to be “taonga”, meaning a treasure.
Takahē are large, round, flightless birds with red legs, and they have lived in New Zealand since prehistoric times. Like many New Zealand birds, takahē evolved to be flightless because there were no mammals to compete with. When Europeans arrived in New Zealand, however, predators such as cats and ferrets were introduced and killed off many flightless birds. Takahē were declared extinct in 1898, but a small number of the birds were discovered in 1948 in a remote part of the Murchison Mountains.
Since then, conservationists have been trying to restore the takahē population in captivity. They gathered the bird’s eggs in order to keep the chicks safe from predators. The chicks were raised by volunteers, who fed them while wearing sockpuppets on their hands to imitate the parent birds. There are now about 500 takahē birds in captivity. Several pairs of adult birds have been released into the island’s sanctuaries and national parks. Experts will monitor them to see how they adapt to their new environment. If everything goes well, they hope to release seven more birds this month and 10 young birds next year.
Ta Tipene O’Regan, an elder of the Ngai Tahu tribe, helped to release the birds. He told The Guardian newspaper, ”There are few things more beautiful than to watch these large birds running back into lands where they haven’t walked for over a century. ”O’Regan said, “It’s an absolute joy. ”
1. As for Maori people, takahē are ______.| A．valuable | B．dangerous | C．adaptable | D．entertaining |
| A．Big bodies | B．Long time captivity. |
| C．Native people’s protection. | D．No competitors. |
| A．Eggs. | B．Predators. | C．Baby birds | D．Parent takahē. |
| A．Native Birds back in the Wild | B．A Big Joy of Maori Tribes |
| C．Rare Eggs Protected by Volunteers | D．Distinct Mammals in New Zealand |
【推荐3】On Tuesday, India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched a series of new high-producing crop varieties, including herbicide-tolerant (耐除草剂的) rice that can be directly planted into the soil, cutting the huge expenses on water and farm workers.
In India, the world’s biggest rice exporter, the traditional method of rice growing requires farmers to grow seeds in nurseries, and then wait for 20 to 30 days before transplanting the small plants by hand into the fields that are ankle-deep in water.
With the new seed varieties developed by the state-run Indian Agricultural Research Institute, farmers only need to water the field once to moisten (使湿润) the soil before planting the rice. Besides, the traditional method also uses a lot of water to control weeds as herbicides are costly and often do not distinguish between the rice and the unwanted weeds.
Government scientists said the new rice varieties contained a gene that would allow farmers to spray a common, inexpensive herbicide without worrying about any side effects. “Our focus is very high on new seeds that can be adapted to new conditions, especially in changing climates,” Modi said.
Water conservation is likely to be the main attraction of the new rice varieties in India, where farmers rely heavily on monsoon (季风) rains. The traditional method uses 3,000 to 5,000 liters of water to produce 1 kg rice. The new varieties could cut water use by at least 50% to 60%, farmers and government officials say. “For farmers like us, the main concern was the management of water, and the new varieties take care of that concern,” said Ravindra Kajal, who grows rice on his 9-acre farmland in the northern state of Haryana. India is also the world’s biggest rice producer after China.
1. Which is the benefit of the new rice?| A．It can produce herbicide. | B．It can be planted in any field. |
| C．It needs a lot of water to grow. | D．It can save money for the farmers. |
| A．The new rice contains herbicide itself. |
| B．The herbicide is suitable for all rice varieties. |
| C．Genes in the new rice can avoid harm from herbicide. |
| D．The herbicide can distinguish the rice from the weeds. |
| A．Water. | B．Temperature. | C．Wind. | D．Sunlight. |
| A．India Launches New Herbicides. | B．India Cuts Expenses on Farming. |
| C．India Promotes New Rice Varieties. | D．Farmers Appeal for New Rice Varieties. |
