Question

Elephants are the largest land animals and they need plenty of living space. They have seasonal migration (迁徙) routes. As human populations rise, elephant land is being cleared for agriculture and other kinds of development.

When animals are effectively trapped on small areas of land, it restricts the gene pool and also results in a shortage of food. Where elephant reserves (保护区) border agricultural areas, elephants are often attracted to leave parks to attack crops and barns. Only the strongest walls will stop an adult elephant (males can weigh 6,000kg), so farmers have great difficulty protecting their fields.

In India, elephants don’t only attack for food. Some even have developed a taste for rice beer. In Assam, elephant-human conflict has resulted in the death of more than 150 people and 200 elephants in the space of two years.

Poverty leads to the killing of elephants for meat. If people don’t have enough food and their governments cannot afford to enforce poaching(偷猎) bans, it’s not difficult to predict the outcome.

Ivory comes form elephant tusks(象牙), which can grow to be 3 meters long. Both male and female African elephants have large tusks.

Most new ivory comes from Africa and is sold as a high status material in Asian countries such as Thailand, mainland China and Japan. It can fetch $150 an pound and is carved to make decorations, chopsticks and ink stamps. The conservation (保护) priority (重点) here is to change public attitudes.

In some countries in southern Africa, where conservation efforts have been successful, there is not enough room for a growing elephant population and animals have to be killed. A CITES meeting in November 2002 ruled that Botswana, Namibia and South Africa may sell stock-piled ivory, starting in2004.

Many conservationists are convinced that this will fuel the demand for ivory and lead to more illegal poaching, they say it is almost impossible to tell legal from poached ivory. The governments argue that the sales will be used to fund conservation work.

 

64. Which of the following isn’t the result of smaller elephant land?

   A. Seasonal migration.                       B. Elephant-human conflict.

   C. Restricting the gene pool.               D. Shortage of food.

65. The most important thing to protect elephants is ____.

A. to build strongest walls                     B. to change people’s ideas

C. to enforce poaching bans                  D. to sell stock-piled ivory instead of illegal ivory

66. What does the underlined word “this” in the last paragraph refer to?

   A. the killing of elephants for meat       B. the ban of the trade in African elephant ivory

   C. the selling of stock-piled ivory         D. the sales to fund conservation work

67. Which of the following statements is NOT true?

   A. The increasing human population is the main reason for less elephant land.

   B. All elephants don’t attack for food.

   C. People in some southern African countries have to kill elephants because elephant-human conflict is too fierce there.

   D. Within two years, over 150 people were killed in the elephant-human conflict.

68. According to the passage, we can infer that ____.

   A. farmers have difficulty in protecting their field because no walls can stop an adult elephant.

   B. if the government could help solve poverty, there would be less killing of elephants.

   C. only male elephants in Africa have tusks as long as 3 meters.

   D. since there is not enough room for a growing elephant population, there is no need to ban poaching all over Africa

Answer 1

ABCCB