1 . A baby born in India has been declared the world's seven billionth person by child rights group Plan International. Baby Nargis was born at 07:25 local time (01:55GMT) in Mall village in India's Uttar Pradesh state. Plan International says Nargis has been chosen symbolically as it is not possible to know where exactly the seven billionth baby is born. In addition to baby Nargis in India, Bangladesh, the Philippines and Cambodia have all identified seven billionth babies. The United Nations estimated that on Monday 31 October, the world's population would reach seven billion.

Populations are growing faster than economies in many poor countries in Africa and some in Asia. At the same time, low birth rates in Japan and many European nations have raised concerns about labor shortages.

Population experts at the United Nations estimated that the world reached six billion in October 1999. They predict nine billion by 2050 and ten billion by the end of the century. China's population of one and a third billion is currently the world's largest. India is second at 1.2 billion. But India is expected to pass China and reach one and a half billion people around 2025.

India will also have one of the world's youngest populations. Economists say this is a chance for a so-called demographic dividend. India could gain from the skills of young people in a growing economy at a time when other countries have aging populations. But economists say current rates of growth, although high, may not create enough jobs. Also, the public education system is failing to meet demand and schooling is often of poor quality. Another concern is health care. Nearly half of India's children under the age of five are malnourished.

Michal Rutkowski, the director of human development in South Asia at the World Bank, says reaching seven billion people in the world is a good time for a call to action. He says, "I think the bottom line of the story is that the public policy needs to become really, really serious about sex equality and about access to services -- to fight against malnutrition, and to provide for access to health services, water and schooling."

1. What is true about the world's seven billionth person?

A．Bangladesh, the Philippines and Cambodia have all declared Baby Nargis as the seven billionth baby.

B．Baby Nargis has been chosen carefully so it is exactly the seven billionth baby

C．Baby Nargis is not the only child chosen as the seven billionth baby.

D．The United Nations declared Baby Nargis born in India's Uttar Pradesh state as the world's seven billionth person.

2. Which of the following problems do many European countries worry about?

A．Schooling of poor quality.	B．Poor health care.
C．Not enough jobs.	D．Labor shortage.

3. According to population experts, how long will it take for population to grow from six billion to nine billion?

A．About 50 years.

B．About 40 years.

C．About 12 years.

D．About 110 years.

4. What does the underlined phrase “demographic dividend” in the fourth paragraph refer to?

A．Possibility of lower birth rate.	B．Disadvantages caused by aging population.
C．Chances for more employment.	D．Benefit gained by working age people

5. Which of the following public policies does Michal Rutkowski call on?

A．To improve health and education.	B．To reduce world’s population.
C．To gain economic equality.	D．To encourage late marriage.

3 . Why is the world’s population growing?     1    . The reason for the explosion is not that people have been reproducing like rabbits, but that people have stopped dropping dead like flies. In 1900, people died at the average age of 30. By 2000 the average age was 65. But while increasing health was a typical feature of the 20th century, declining birth rate could be a defining one of the twenty-first century.

Statistics show that the average number of births per woman has fallen from 4.9 in the early 1960s to 2.5 nowadays. Furthermore, around 50% of the world’s population live in regions where the figure is now below the replacement level (i.e. 2.1 births per woman) and almost all developed nations are experiencing sub-replacement birth rate.     2    , but you’d be wrong. Declining birth rate is a major problem in many developing regions too, which might cause catastrophic global shortages of work force within a few decades.

    3    What does it imply? First, China needs to undergo rapid economic development before a population decline hits the country. Second, if other factors such as technology remain constant, economic growth and material expectations will fall well below recent standards and this could invite trouble.

Russia is another country with population problems that could break its economic promise. Since 1992 the number of people dying has been bigger than that of those being born by a massive 50%. Indeed official figures suggest the country has shrunk by 5% since 1993 and people in Russia live a shorter life now than those in 1961.     4    Nobody is quite sure, but poor diet and above all long-time alcoholism have much to do with it. If current trends don’t bend, Russia’s population will be about the size of Yemen’s by the year 2050.

    5    As for the USA, it is almost unique among developed nations in having a population that is expected to grow by 20% from 2010—2030. Moreover, the USA has a track record of successfully accepting immigrants. As a result it’s likely to see a rise in the size of its working-age population and to witness strong economic growth over the longer term.

A．Why is this occurring?

B．How can the problem be solved?

C．The answer is not what you might think.

D．You might think that developing nations would make up the loss.

E．One solution obviously to import foreign workers via immigration.

F．A great decline in young work force is likely to occur in China for instance.

G．In 2030, a sixth of the country's potential work force could be totally uneducated.

4 . Figures published by the UK government in 2006 revealed that: 42% of marriages in the UK end in divorce: 24% of children grow up in single-parent families: the average number of children in a British family is 1.9.     1     Is it an endangered species?

With the average number of children in a British family falling beneath an average of 2.0, the population of the UK has been falling for quite a few years. The size of the British workforce is declining and the average age of the workforce is rising.     2    

Why aren’t the British having as many children as they used to?     3     One of them is that British people are now having their children at a much older age than previously, meaning they have fewer years in which they can have children.

    4     Well, houses are incredibly expensive in the UK, so many people are forced to stay with their parents early in their careers. And no one wants to start a new family when they are still living with their parents! So it’s not until people are about 30 years old that they can afford to move out, buy their own home, and then they can start to think about setting down and having children.

So what is Britain doing to try and save the British family?     5     There have been increases in Child Benefit money families can claim from the state. Also, there is an increasing amount of government subsidy (补贴) for nursery schools, so that parents do not need to pay so much for childcare. In addition. there are now laws allowing parents to take more time off work so that they can look after their children themselves rather than having to pay others to do it.

A．Well, there is a whole range of reasons.

B．So what is happening to the British family?

C．What about marriage and buying a home?

D．This trend is quite worrying for the British economy.

E．It’s a bad “work-life balance” and is damaging British society.

F．First of all, the government is trying to make it cheaper to have children.

G．The main reason is that it is relatively expensive to bring up a child in the UK.

5 . People are making more and more demands on the world’s natural resources. If babies born in 1991 live for eighty years, the human population of the world may be anything from twice to three times the present total by 2070. In other words, they will have to share what is left of the earth’s resources with 15 billion other people. But hopefully there will be a significant decrease in the growth of population. What if this does not happen? The answer is that by the time before the babies born in 1991 reach the age of 40 they could be sharing resources with as many as 10 billion other people.

Limiting the pollution of water and the atmosphere, controlling the output of the chemicals that may be causing the global warming and climate change, and eating less meat may go some way to help, but can anyone seriously imagine that these are going to solve the problems of the“baby class”of 1991?

There is no getting away from the fact that people are responsible for the present state of the world, and only people can solve the problems. The decisions have to be taken by people as members of national and local governments, as leaders and decision-makers in industry; as scientists and technologists; as professional engineers and designers; as religious leaders and individual citizens.

1. Which of the following can be the best title of the passage?

A．Making More Demands on the Natural Resources.

B．Limiting the Pollution of Air and Water

C．Reducing the World Population

D．Saving the Babies of 1991

2. What is meant by“the problems of the ‘baby class’of 1991”?

A．A large number of babies will be born after 1991.

B．Babies born in 1991 won’t live a long life.

C．The children of 1991 are not given good education.

D．The problems caused by babies born in 1991.

3. This short passage is probably taken from

A．a news report

B．a science fiction

C．an article by a medical worker

D．a government report

4. Which of the following is NOT mentioned in the last paragraph as people responsible for the present state of the world?

A．Officials.	B．Industrialists.
C．Businessmen.	D．Scientists.

6 . People have always been defined by their generation. We had the baby boomers of the 1960s, followed by Generation X and then Generation Y, often referred to as millennials, and the new kids on the block are Generation Z - aged between 16 and 22. It's easy to classify these young people as all being the same, sharing the same attitudes towards life—but is that fair?

People from Generation Z, informally called "Z-ers", may be viewed by others as digital natives, incapable of real-world friendships. But they actually view themselves as hardworking, ambitious and about to change the world for the better. The previous generation, born between the mid-1980s and late 1990s - the millennials were also thought to have these characteristics. But many people view this new generation as “mini-millennials" because Z-ers are different and they have their own set of values and preferences which consumer brands need to cater for.

It's true to say that technology is playing an important part in the lives of Generation Z, particularly in the area of social media. In fact, they have not known life without it and using it to communicate, share ideas and campaign is second nature. It means they have more of a say on what we eat, drink and buy than any generation before them. These young people certainly need to be listened to by retailers （零售商） and businesses - they are the people with time on their hands and money.

But being a Z-er comes with pressure. One young person says "Many people in Generation Z have mental health issues because they're unsure what the future will bring." The future always brings uncertainties but maybe there is pressure for this generation to be the most successful ever.

1. When was a Z-er likely to be born?

A．In 1964.	B．In 1975.
C．In 1987.	D．In 1999.

2. What do Z-ers see themselves as?

A．Diligent and ambitious.	B．Hardworking and incapable.
C．Promising and different.	D．Stressed and successful.

3. What're Paragraphs 2&3 trying to argue?

A．Z-ers have known life without social media.

B．Z-ers pay too much attention to digital devices.

C．Z-ers and the millennials have the same personality.

D．Z-ers become a key driving force in the consumer market.

4. What docs the author think is the real cause of the Z-ers' pressure?

A．Their ambition to be the best.

B．Their uncertainty of the future.

C．Their addiction to digital devices.

D．Their lack of real-world friendship.

7 . Agriculture plays an essential role in the rise of the human civilization. Even though agriculture is contributing to employment of a significant part of the population in majority nations, over the years, the percentage of workers has witnessed a steep decline. According to world-wide estimations, not even five percentage of the population in rich nations is employed in the agricultural sector.

Agriculture is still the backbone of the economy in several nations of Africa. According to data released by the World Bank in 2017, the top ten countries where agriculture plays a vital role in employment are in Africa. Burundi, the landlocked nation on the eastern side of the continent, has 91% of its population dependent on it. However, only 15% of the total agricultural production goes to the market. Sweet potatoes, beans, bananas and corn, are some major crops produced on the land.

The second largest employment in agriculture was also registered in an African country； Chad with 87% population working on the field. Other nations which follow on the list are： Somalia, Central African Republic, Malawi, Eritrea, Guinea-Bissau, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Niger, Mauritania, Madagascar and Mozambique. Amid the developing countries of BRICS, it is India where more people are employed by agriculture. The agriculture in India can be traced back to the era of Indus Valley Civilization. By 2017, 43 % of the Indian population is dependent on the agriculture sector for employment.

Meanwhile, many developed countries witness less than 15 percent of their population engaged in the agriculture sector. These nations include Greece, Malaysia, Russia, New Zealand, the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, Canada, Australia, France, Italy, Japan, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, and many others. At the bottom of the list stand United Arab Emirates , Singapore and Hong Kong, with 0 % of its people employed in agriculture.

1. What does the writer want to highlight in the first paragraph?

A．Agriculture is the foundation of civilization.

B．Agriculture is the main sector of employment.

C．Agriculture is the backbone of the economy.

D．The agricultural population is in sharp decline.

2. Most part of the agricultural produce in Burundi ________.

A．is for family use	B．goes to the market
C．is used for export	D．goes to the government

3. Where does Central African Republic rank in employment in agriculture in the world?

A．Second.	B．Third.
C．Fourth.	D．Fifth.

4. We can infer from the text that the larger population in agriculture ________.

A．the more developed the country	B．the less developed the economy
C．the more advanced the civilization	D．the longer the history of a country

8 . Basic to any understanding of Canada in 20 years after the Second World War is the country’s impressive population growth. In September 1966 Canada’s population passed the 20 million mark. Most of this growth came from natural increase. The depression of the 1930’s and the war had held back marriages and the catching - up process began after 1945. The baby boom continued through the decade of the 1950’s, producing a population increase of nearly fifteen percent in the five years from 1951 to 1956. Undoubtedly, the good economic conditions of the 1950’s supported a growth in the population, but the expansion also derived (源自) from a trend toward earlier marriages and an increase in the average size of families. In 1957 the Canadian birth rate stood at 28 per thousand, one of the highest in the world.

After the peak year of 1957, the birth rate in Canada began to decline. It continued falling until in 1966 it stood at the lowest level in 25 years. Partly this decline reflected the low level of births during the depression and the war, but it was also caused by changes in Canadian society. Young people were staying at school longer, more women were working, young married couples were buying automobiles or houses before starting families, rising living standards were cutting down the size of families. It appeared that Canada was once more falling in step with the trend toward smaller families that had occurred all through the Western world since the time of the Industrial Revolution.

Although the growth in Canada’s population had slowed down by 1966 (the increase in the first half of the 1960’s was only nine percent), another large population wave was coming over the horizon. It would be composed of the children who were born during the period of the high birth rate before 1957.

1. From paragraph 1 we know that in Canada during the 1950 ________.

A．Fewer people married.	B．The birth rate was very high.
C．Economic conditions were poor.	D．The population decreased rapidly.

2. Which is not the cause of declines in population growth after 1957?

A．Couples buying houses.	B．Better standards of living.
C．People getting married earlier.	D．People being better educated.

3. What does the underlined “it” in the last paragraph refer to?

A．Nine percent.	B．Population wave.
C．The first half of the 1960’s.	D．Population’s slowing down.

4. What does the passage mainly discuss?

A．Educational changes in Canadian society.

B．Canada during the Second World War.

C．Population trends in postwar Canada.

D．Standards of living in Canada.

9 . 阅读下列短文，根据短文内容填空。在未给提示词的空白处仅填写 1个适当的单词，在给出提示词的空白处用括号内所给词的正确形式填空。

This aging of the population is driven by two factors. The first is declining birth rates, which means old generations are large     1    （compare） to younger generations, and so, on average, the population becomes older than before. This is     2    （especial） true in the US. The second reason is     3     people are living longer. A child born in the US today has a very realistic chance of living beyond 100 and needs to plan accordingly.

10 . 阅读下面材料，在空白处填入适当的内容（1个单词）或括号内单词的正确形式。

China has allowed all couples to have two children,    1    (abandon) its decades-long one-child policy. The change of policy    2    (intend) to balance population development and address the challenge of an aging population.

With reference to the new policy, some single-child parents can’t wait to welcome new babies. However, many factors    3    (consider), some feel a dilemma, associated with their decision to have one more child. For one thing, it seems    4    (benefit) as there are no other children in the family for the only child to associate with,    5    may lead to the child feeling lonely at times, especially during    6    (vacation).

For another, a common argument    7    having just one child may be more spoiled than one with brothers or sisters. Many people believe that a single child won't have to learn to negotiate with others, and respect the give-and-take involved in many relationships. Some think this may leave the child less able to interact    8    (good) with people his or her own age than one who has been raised with brothers or sisters.

However, the pressure of giving time and energy to a second child can seem too great, particularly for those with busy careers, resulting in    9    (they) selecting to have no more children. For some other parents,    10    financial burden of having a second child may be the prime consideration.