https://padlet.com/magdatebbutt/77c9cbd71n4g EAP5 A, Wk. 1: Tuesday (AM Lesson) en-us 2018-06-19 00:17:45 UTC 2018-06-19 00:56:54 UTC hello@padlet.com magdatebbutt https://padlet.com/magdatebbutt/77c9cbd71n4g/wish/267702314 What is a subsidy?
What do you think a farm subsidy is and why do they exist?
Does this concept exist in your country? Discuss.

]]> 2018-06-19 00:19:24 UTC https://padlet.com/magdatebbutt/77c9cbd71n4g/wish/267702314 magdatebbutt https://padlet.com/magdatebbutt/77c9cbd71n4g/wish/267702388 The role of governments in environmental management is difficult but inescapable. Sometimes, the state tries to manage the resources it owns, and does so badly. Often, however, governments act in an even more harmful way. They actually subsidise the exploitation and consumption of natural resources. A whole range of policies, from farm-price support to protection for coal-mining, do environmental damage and (often) make no economic sense. Scrapping them offers a two-fold bonus: a cleaner environment and a more efficient economy. Growth and environmentalism can actually go hand in hand, if politicians have the courage to confront the vested interests that subsidies create. 

No activity affects more of the earth's surface than farming. It shapes a third of the planet's land area, not counting Antarctica, and the proportion is rising. World food output per head has risen by 4 per cent between the 1970s and 1980s mainly as a result of increases in yields from land already in cultivation, but also because more land has been brought under the plough. Higher yields have been achieved by increased irrigation, better crop breeding, and a doubling in the use of pesticides and chemical fertilisers in the 1970s and 1980s. 

All these activities may have damaging environmental impacts. For example, land clearing for agriculture is the largest single cause of deforestation; chemical fertilisers and pesticides may contaminate water supplies; more intensive farming and the abandonment of fallow periods tend to exacerbate soil erosion; and the spread of monoculture and use of high-yielding varieties of crops have been accompanied by the disappearance of old varieties of food plants which might have provided some insurance against pests or diseases in future. Soil erosion threatens the productivity of land in both rich and poor countries. The United States, where the most careful measurements have been done, discovered in 1982 that about one-fifth of its farmland was losing topsoil at a rate likely to diminish the soil's productivity. The country subsequently embarked upon a program to convert 11 per cent of its cropped land to meadow or forest. Topsoil in India and China is vanishing much faster than in America. 


]]> 2018-06-19 00:20:25 UTC https://padlet.com/magdatebbutt/77c9cbd71n4g/wish/267702388 magdatebbutt https://padlet.com/magdatebbutt/77c9cbd71n4g/wish/267702608 1. The government’s role in environmental management is:
a. important
b. unavoidable
c. controversial
d. none of these

2. The writer argues that farm subsidies should be:
a. increased
b. supported
c. reduced 
d. removed

3. The passage says that increases in farm production have been achieved through:
a. natural means
b. unnatural means
c. increased investment
d. none of these

4. some of the disadvantages of modern farming practices include:
a. greater soil erosion
b. poisons entering the water supply
c. threats to biodiversity
d. all of these


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