Unit 7: World population - Reading

Exercise 1: Choose the word or phrase - a, b, c or d - that best fits the blank space in the following passage. Mexico City is growing quickly. In 1970, the city had about 9 million people. Now it has over 17 million. All these people are causing (1) ______ for the city. There are not (2) ______ jobs. Also, there is' not enough housing. Large families have to live together in small homes. Many homes do not have water. They also do not have bathrooms or electricity. The Mexican government is (3) ______ about all these problems. It is working hard to make (4) ______ better in the city. Why is Mexico City growing so (5) ______? Where are all these people coming from? They are coming to the city from the country. Life is hard on the farms in Mexico. Most people on farms have to live a very simple life. They have no (6) ____ money for modern things. People think life in the city must be (7) ______. So they leave their farms and move to Mexico City. All around the world, large cities have the same problems. One of them is air (8) ______. Mexico City has pad air. It is dirty and (9) ______. Cars are one reason for the dirty air. Many Mexicans now own their own cars and drive in the city. The factories in the area also cause air pollution. These factories put a lot of (10) ______ into the air. It is not easy to clean up the air in a large city. The government has to make new laws, and everyone has to help.

Exercise 2: Read the passage carefully, then choose the correct answers. The dramatic growth of the world's population in the twentieth century was on a scale without parallel in human history. Most of this growth had occurred since 1950 and was known as the population 'explosion'. Between 1950 and 1980 the world population increased from 2.5 to over 4 billion, and by the end of the twenty century the figure had risen to about 6.6 billion. Growth of this size cannot continue indefinitely. Recent forecasts suggest that the total population will level out at between 10 and 15 billion in the mid twenty first century. Already there are encouraging signs that the rate of increase in many less developed countries is beginning to slow down.