Section II Reading Comprehension Part A

　　Directions:

　　Read the following four texts. Answer the questions below each text by choosing A, B, C or D. Mark your answers on the ANSWER SHEET. (40 points)

　　Reskilling is something that sounds like a buzzword but is actually a requirement if we plan to have a future where a lot of would-be workers do not get left behind.

　　We know we are moving into a period where the jobs in demand will change rapidly, as will the requirements of the jobs that remain. Research by the WEF detailed in the Harvard Business Review, finds that on average 42 per cent of the "core skill" within job roles will change by 2022. That is a very short timeline, so we can only imagine what the changes will be further in the future.

　　The question of who should pay for reskilling is a thorny one. For individual companies, the temptation is always to let go of workers whose skills are no longer demand and replace them with those whose skills are. That does not always happen. AT&T is often given as the gold standard of a company who decided to do a massive reskilling program rather than go with a fire-and-hire strategy ultimately retraining 18,000 employees. Prepandemic, other companies including Amazon and Disney had also pledged to create their own plans. When the skills mismatch is in the broader economy though, the focus usually turns to government to handle. Efforts in Canada and elsewhere have been arguably languid at best, and have given us a situation where we frequently hear of employers begging for workers even at times and in regions where unemployment is high.

　　With the pandemic, unemployment is very high indeed. In February, at 3.5 per cent and 5.5 per cent respectively, unemployment rates in Canada and the United States were at generational lows and worker shortages were everywhere. As of May, those rates had spiked up to 13.3 per cent and 13.7 per cent, and although many worker shortages had disappeared, not all had done so. In the medical field, to take an obvious example the pandemic meant that there were still clear shortages of doctors, nurses and other medical personnel.

　　Of course, it is not like you can take an unemployed waiter and train him to be doctor in few weeks, no matter who pays for it. But even if you cannot close that gap, maybe you can close others, and doing so would be to the benefit of all concerned. That seems to be the case in Sweden, where the pandemic kick-started a retraining program where business as well as government had a role.

　　Reskilling in this way would be challenging in a North American context. You can easily imagine chorus of "can't do that" because teachers or nurses or whoever have special skills, and using any support who has been quickly trained is bound to end in disaster, Maybe. Or maybe it is something that can work well in Sweden, with its history of co-operation between businesses, labor and government, but not in North America where our history is very different. Then again, maybe it is akin to wartime, when extraordinary things take place but it is business as usual after the fact. And yet, as in war the pandemic is teaching us that many things, including rapid reskilling, can be done if there is a will to do them. In any case. Sweden's work force is now more skilled, in more things, and more flexible than it was before.

　　Of course, reskilling programs, whether for pandemic needs or the post pandemic world, are expensive and at a time when everyone's budgets are lean this may not be the time to implement them. Then again, extending income support programs to get us through the next months is expensive, too, to say nothing of the cost of having a swath of long-term unemployed in the POST-COVID years given that, perhaps we should think hard about whether the pandemic can jump-start us to a place where reskilling becomes much more than a buzzword.

　　21.Research by the World Economic Forum suggests_____

　　A.an increase in full-time employment

　　B.an urgent demand for new job skills

　　C.a steady growth of job opportunities

　　D.a controversy about the "core skills"

　　22.AT&T is cited to show_____

　　A.an alternative to the fire-and-hire strategy

　　B.an immediate need for government support

　　C.the importance of staff appraisal standards

　　D.the characteristics of reskilling program

　　23.Efforts to resolve the skills mismatch in Canada_____

　　A.have driven up labor costs

　　B.have proved to be inconsistent

　　C.have met with fierce opposition

　　D.have appeared to be insufficient

　　24.We can learn from Paragraph 3 that there was_____.

　　A.a call for policy adjustment.

　　B.a change in hiring practices.

　　C.a lack of medical workers.

　　D.a sign of economic recovery.

　　25.Scandinavian Airlines decided to_____.

　　A.Great job vacancies for the unemployed.

　　B.Prepare their laid-off workers for other jobs.

　　C.Retrain their cabin staff for better services.

　　D.finance their staff's college education.

　　With the global population predicted to hit close to 10 billion by 2050, and forecasts that agricultural production in one regions will need to nearly double to keep pace, food security is increasingly making headlines In the UK, it has become a big talking point recently too, for a rather particular reason: Brexit.

　　Brexit is seen by some as an opportunity to reverse a recent trend towards the UK importing food. The country produces only about 60 per cent of the food it eats, down from almost three-quarters in the late 1980s. A move back to self-sufficiency, the argument goes, would boost the farming industry, political sovereignty and even the nations health, Sounds great but how feasible is this vision?

　　According to a report on UK food production from the University of Leeds, UK, 85 percent of the country's total land area is associated with meat and dairy production. That supplies 80 percent of what is consumed, so even covering the whole country in livestock farms wouldn't allow us to cover all our meat and dairy needs.

　　There are many caveats to those figures, but they are still grave. To become much more self-sufficient. The UK would need to drastically reduce its consumption of animal foods, and probably also farm more intensively meaning fewer green fields and more factory style production.

　　But switching to a mainly plant-based diet wouldn't help. There is a good reason why the UK is dominated by animal husbandry, most of its terrain doesn't have the right soil or climate to grow crops on commercial basis. Just 25 per cent of the country's land is suitable for crop-growing, most of which is already occupied by arable fields. Even if we converted all the suitable land to fields of fruit and vegetable which would involve taking out all the nature reserves and removing thousands of people from their homes-we would achieve only a 30 percent boost in crop production.

　　Just 23 per cent of the fruit and vegetables consumed in the UK are currently home-grown, so even with the most extreme measures we could meet only 30 per cent of our fresh produce needs. That is before we look for the space to grow the grains, sugars, seeds and oils that provide us with the vast bulk of our current calorie intake.

　　26.Some people argue that food self-sufficiency in the UK would_____.

　　A.a be hindered by its population growth

　　B.contribute to the nations well-being

　　C.become a priority of the government

　　D.post a challenge to its farming industry

　　27.The report by the University of Leeds showed that in the UK_____.

　　A.farmland has been inefficiently utilised

　　B.factory style production needs reforming

　　C.most land is used for meat and dairy production

　　D.more green fields will be converted for farming

　　28.Crop-growing in the UK is restricted due to_____.

　　A.its farming technology

　　B.its dietary tradition

　　C.its natural conditions

　　D.its commercial interests

　　29.It can be learned from the last paragraph that British people_____.

　　A.rely largely on imports for fresh produce

　　B.enjoy a steady rise in fruit consumption

　　C.are seeking effective ways to cut calorie intake

　　D.are trying to grow new varieties of grains

　　30.The author's attitude to food self-efficiency in the UK is_____.

　　A.defensive

　　B.doubtful

　　C.tolerant

　　D.optimistic

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