Although the insistence on balancing spending against tax revenues has contributed to the economy’s stagnation, unfortunately, the government does not seem likely to ___ this rigid policy.
A. initiate
B. persist in
C. publicize
D. repudiate
E. continue
F. recant
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Last Friday an advisory panel to the European Environment Agency issued an extraordinary scientific opinion: The European Union should suspend its goal of having 10 percent of transportation fuel made from biofuel by 2020.
The European Union&39;s biofuel targets were increased and extended from 5.75 percent by 2010 to 10 percent by 2020 just last year. Still, Europe&39;s well-meaning rush to biofuels, the scientists concluded, had produced a slew of harmful ripple effects - from deforestation in Southeast Asia to higher prices for grains.
In a recommendation released last weekend, the 20-member panel, made up of some of Europe&39;s most distinguished climate scientists, called the 10 percent target "overambitious" and an "experiment" whose "unintended effects are difficult to predict and difficult to control."
"The idea was that we felt we needed to slow down, to analyze the issue carefully and then come back at the problem," Laszlo Somlyody, the panel&39;s chairman and a professor at the Budapest University of Technology and Economics, said in a telephone interview.
He said that part of the problem was that when it set the targets, the European Union was trying desperately to solve the problem of rising transportation emissions "in isolation," without adequately studying the effects of other sectors like land use and food supply.
"The starting point was correct: I&39;m happy that the European Union took the lead in cutting greenhouse gasses and we need to control traffic emissions," Somlyody said. "But the basic problem is it thought of transport alone, without considering all these other effects. And we don&39;t understand those very well yet." The panel&39;s advice is not binding and it is not clear whether the European Commission will follow the recommendation.
It has become increasingly clear that the global pursuit of biofuels - encouraged by a rash of targets and subsides in both Europe and the United States - has not produced the desired effect.
Investigations have shown, for example, rain forests and peat swamp are being cleared to make way for biofuel plantations, a process that produces more emissions than the biofuels can save. Equally concerning, land needed to produce food forpeople to eat is planted with more profitable biofuel crops, and water is diverted from the drinking supply.
In Europe and the United States, food prices for items like pizza and bread have increased significantly as grain stores shrink and wheat prices rise.
The price of wheat and rice are double those of a year ago, and corn is a third higher, the UN Food and Agriculture Organization said this week.
"Food price inflation hits the poor hardest, as the share of food in their total expenditures is much higher than that of wealthier populations," said Henri Josserand of the Food and Agriculture Organization
For example, the European Environment Agency advisory panel suggests that the best use of plant biomass is not for transport fuel but to heat homes and generate electricity.
To be useful for vehicles, plant matter must be distilled to a fuel and often transported long distances. To heat a home, it can often be used raw or with minimal processing, and moved just a short distance away. -
LECCO, Italy — Each morning, about 450 students travel along 17 school bus routes to 10 elementary schools in this lakeside city at the southern tip of Lake Como. There are zero school buses.
In 2003, to confront the triple threats of childhood obesity, local traffic jams and — most important — a rise in global greenhouse gases abetted by car emissions, an environmental group here proposed a retro-radical concept: children should walk to school.
They set up a piedibus （literally foot-bus in Italian) — a bus route with a driver but no vehicle. Each morning a mix of paid staff members and parental volunteers in fluorescent yellow vests lead lines of walking students along Lecco？ s twisting streets to the schools？ gates, Pied Piper-style, stopping here and there as their flock expands.
At the Carducci School, 100 children, or more than half of the students, now take walking buses. Many of them were previously driven in cars. Giulio Greppi, a 9-year-old with shaggy blond hair, said he had been driven about a third of a mile each way until he started taking the piedibus. “I get to see my friends and we feel special because we know it？ s good for the environment,” he said.
Although the routes are each generally less than a mile, the town？ s piedibuses have so far eliminated more than 100,000 miles of car travel and, in principle, prevented thousands of tons of greenhouse gases from entering the air, Dario Pesenti, the town？ s environment auditor, estimates.
The number of children who are driven to school over all is rising in the United States and Europe, experts on both continents say, making up a sizable chunk of transportation？ s contribution to greenhouse-gas emissions. The “school run” made up 18 percent of car trips by urban residents of Britain last year, a national survey showed.
In 1969, 40 percent of students in the United States walked to school; in 2001, the most recent year data was collected, 13 percent did, according to the federal government？ s National Household Travel Survey.
Lecco？ s walking bus was the first in Italy, but hundreds have cropped up elsewhere in Europe and, more recently, in North America to combat the trend. Towns in France, Britain and elsewhere in Italy have created such routes, although few are as extensive and long-lasting as Lecco？ s. -
全球气候变化深刻影响着人类生存和发展，是各国共同面临的重大挑战。
气候变化是人类发展进程中出现的问题，既受自然因素影响，也受人类活动影响，既是环境问题，更是发展问题，同各国发展阶段、生活方式、人口规模、资源禀赋以及国际产业分工等因素密切相关。归根到底，应对气候变化问题应该也只能在发展过程中推进，应该也只能靠共同发展来解决。
中国已经制定和实施了《应对气候变化国家方案》，明确提出2005年到2010年降低单位国内生产总值能耗和主要污染物排放、提高森林覆盖率和可再生能源比重等有约束力的国家指标。
今后，中国将进一步把应对气候变化纳入经济社会发展规划，并继续采取强有力的措施。一是加强节能、提高能效工作，争取到2020年单位国内生产总值二氧化碳排放比2005年有显著下降。二是大力发展可再生能源和核能，争取到2020年非化石能源占一次能源消费比重达到15％左右。三是大力增加森林碳汇，争取到2020年森林面积比2005年增加4000万公顷，森林蓄积量比2005年增加13亿立方米。四是大力发展绿色经济，积极发展低碳经济和循环经济，研发和推广气候友好技术。 -
Since it was committed to the idea of science as an international, politically neutral enterprise, the Royal Society of London refused to ___ members from enemy nations during world wars of the twentieth century.
A.betray
B.expel
C.endorse
D.oust
E.sanction
F.condemn -
国际金融危机给中国带来了前所未有的困难和挑战。主要表现在：经济下行压力明显加大，进出口继续下滑，工业生产明显放缓，部分企业生产经营困难，就业难度加大。这场国际金融危机与中国发展方式转变、经济结构调整的关键时期不期而遇，新的挑战与既有矛盾相互交织，加大了我们解决问题的难度。
为应对国际金融危机冲击、保持经济平稳较快发展，中国及时调整宏观经济政策，果断实施积极的财政政策和适度宽松的货币政策，形成了进一步扩大内需、促进经济增长的一揽子计划。我们大规模增加政府支出，实施总额4万亿元人民币的两年投资计划，实行结构性减税政策，多次降息和增加银行体系流动性，大范围实施产业调整振兴规划，大力推进科技创新和技术改造，大力加强节能减排和生态环境保护，继续调整国民收入分配格局，大力拓展国内市场特别是农村市场，大幅度提高社会保障水平。
现在，这些措施已取得初步成效、呈现出积极迹象，国内消费需求比较旺盛，投资需求稳步提高，社会大局保持稳定。这表明中国的应对思路是符合实际的，政策是积极有效的。中国为应对国际金融危机冲击采取的一系列举措不仅对本国经济、而且对区域经济乃至世界经济都将产生积极影响。