All around the world, shoppers flock to Wal-Mart to buy everything．In Texas, they come for another reason: to see the wind turbine(涡轮机) , which supplies 5% of the store's electricity．It along with other facilities, such as exterior walls coated with heat-reflective paint, makes this Wal-Mart a green giant．

The laws of economics suggest that Wal-Mart, with 5, 200 stores worldwide, influences everything including the price of all kinds of goods．It throws its weight behind environmental responsibility, and the impact could be amazing．"One little change in product packaging could  save 1, 500 trees," says Wal-Mart CEO Lee Scott．"If everybody saves 1, 500 trees or 50 barrels of oil, at the end of the day you have made a huge difference．"

Scott wants Wal-Mart to do its part too．He has promised to cut the existing greenhouse-gas emissions （排放） over the next few years and promised to construct new stores that are more efficient．He wants Wal-Mart's fleet (车队) of more than 7, 000 trucks to get twice as many miles per gallon by 2015．Factories that show Wal-Mart they're cutting air pollution will get preferential treatment in the supply chain. Wal-Mart says it's working with consumer-product manufacturers to  reduce their packaging and will reward them if they do so．

Some people may doubt it is a bid to attract attention from Wal-Mart's controversial labor and health-insurance practices．But it's not just window dressing, because Wal-Mart sees profits in going green．Scott says, "This is a business philosophy, not a social philosophy．We don't go where we don't think there's a great interest in change．"

Like Bill Gates, who started his charitable foundation, Scott happens to be promoting Wal-Mart's image at a time when his company's reputation is declining．He acknowledges that he launched the plan partly to shield （保护，庇护） Wal-Mart from bad press about its contribution to global warming．" By doing what we're doing today, we avoid the headline risks that are going to come for people who did not do anything," he says．"At some point businesses will be held responsible for the actions they take．" Meanwhile, should Wal-Mart succeed at shrinking its environmental footprint and lowering prices for green products, both the planet and the company will profit．

1.We can infer from the passage that ______．

A. Lee Scott is Wal-Mart's CEO

B. there are 5, 200 stores in the world

C. Wal-Mart has a great influence on the world market

D. Wal-Mart has more than 7, 000 trucks all over the world

2.What does the underlined sentence "This is a business philosophy, not a social philosophy．" mean in the fourth paragraph?

A. Wal-Mart predicts huge profits in its green activity．

B. Wal-Mart's green activity is just window dressing．

C. Wal-Mart aims to solve its health-insurance practices．

D. Wal-Mart doesn't have any social responsibility at all．

3.What will Wal-Mart probably do in the future?

A．Reduce air pollution in its present stores．

B．Give favorable treatment to its consumers．

C．Ask the factories to reduce their packaging．

D．Demand the fleet of trucks to use more fuel than before．

4.What is the main idea of the last paragraph?

A．Provide the background of the green plan．

B．Stress the purpose of Wal-Mart's green plan．

C．Present the risk that Wal-Mart is facing nowadays．

D．Analyze the similarity between Bill Gates and Scott.

Online grocery shopping was counted as the next great innovation to make our lives easier. In China more than 3,000 websites offer the service, but none have turned a profit.

Xiang Nian has had a hard day at the office but at least she can skip the trip to the grocery store. A text message on her phone lets her know the order she placed earlier in the day has been delivered to a locker outside her apartment.

"It’s really convenient for an office worker like me. My fresh products are waiting for me when I get home and can start cooking. No need to go to the supermarket any more," Xiang says.

One of the largest online supermarkets in Wuhan is Just-easy Fresh Produce. Over the past 3 years, the company has developed its online retail grocery business by guaranteeing fresh produce and an innovative delivery system. They've installed thousands of lockers in communitieshttp:// / around downtown Wuhan.

"We get an average of 8,000 orders per day. That's the most in China, I'm proud of it. We have placed over 20 thousand lockers in more than half of the communities in Wuhan and we plan to expand to all of them. Many e-commerce giants, like Taobao, are talking about cooperation with us," Jie Xiaofeng, manager of Wuhan Just-easy Agricultural Science & Technology Co., says.

While Just-easy may have thousands of customers, a staff of almost 300 and 40 delivery trucks, it's still operating in the red.

"There are over 3,000 companies selling fresh products online in China. But none is making a profit. It will take them at least 3 years before they make a profit. The major challenge is the cost of delivery. But they do have many advantages. The price of their goods is lower than the supermarkets," professor He Dehua at Huazhong Agricultural University, says.

A number of China's e-commerce giants are making moves into online grocery sales, with Taobao opening an online platform it calls "Cainiao". And traditional retailers(零售店) including Wal-Mart and Carrefour are also looking to start selling their produce online.

Many big B2C e-commerce players usually take fresh farm produce as the last category to add to their offerings. But now more and more large businesses have set their eyes on the industry. They want to prove the fresh food market is definitely suited to online sales.

1.What is the main idea of the passage?

A. The online grocery shopping is making our life easier.

B. Just-easy Fresh Produce is a pioneer of the online retail grocery business.

C. Conventional retailers are facing challenges.

D. None of the online grocery supermarkets has made a profit.

2.The underlined part “it's still operating in the red” probably means _______.

A. the present situation of the company makes them angry

B. the company is not making a profit

C. the company is very popular with customers

D. the staff of the company are aggressive

3.What can we learn from the last two paragraphs?

A. The fresh food market is definitely suited to online sales.

B. Fresh farm produce is the last category that people will buy online.

C. Online grocery sales have drawn the attention of e-commerce giants.

D. Traditional retailers choose to sell their produce on Cainiao.

4.What’s the author’s attitude towards online grocery shopping?

A. Pessimistic.                      B. Indifferent.                      C. Objective.               D. Supportive.

April sales figures show a disappointing month for Wal-Mart. The world's largest retailer reported a big drop in sales last month―its worst decline in nearly 30 years. As VOA's Mil Arcega reports, Wal-Mart is not alone.

A three and a half percent drop in sales does not seem like much. But for a company that sells more than $300 billion worth of goods every year, analysts say it is significant. 

Alan Murray, the managing editor of the Wall Street Journal, says the drop represents Wal-Mart's biggest decline since 1979. “There are a number of things going on. Part of it is early Easter, so some of those sales got moved into March. Part of it is bad weather.”

But it may also signal a trend.  Across the board, retailers from Target to JC Penny and the Gap, reported weaker sales in April.  Analysts say the decline suggests high gasoline prices and the slowing U.S. housing market are finally catching up with consumers.  Murray says there may be other factors at play.

“Wal-Mart is not doing what it used to do very well. It made an attempt last year to sell clothes to high scale retailers. That didn't work. It had to back off.  It's remodeling（重新塑造） its stores.  That's not working very well,” says Murray.

To bring customers back, some say Wal-Mart needs to go back to its marketing basics. Retail analyst Dana Telsey says that means low priced goods in a friendly retail environment. “I think Wal-Mart is working to enhance（提高）its image. It could always be better. Going back to its roots is a way, that hopefully, customers will become familiar with it again.”

Wal-Mart is one of the biggest economic indicators in the retail industry. As the world's largest profit making enterprise, Wal-Mart's yearly revenues(总收入) represents about 2.5 percent of total economic activity in the U.S. 

60. What would be the best title for this passage?

A. The world’s largest retailer.         

B. The Wal Mart’s biggest drop in sales.

C. The Wal Mart’s biggest revenue in sales.

D. The world’s largest profit making enterprise.

61. According to the passage, the followings are all reasons for Wal Mart’s sales declined in April except _______.

A. cheaper goods

B. unfriendly shopping environment

C. early Easter and unpleasant weather

D. high gasoline prices and the slowing housing market

62. According to the passage, what was the popular image of Wal Mart?

A. It sold clothes to high scale retailers.

B. It often sold discounted goods.

C. It was one of the biggest retailer industries.

D. It sold low priced goods in a friendly atmosphere.

63. By “Wal Mart is one of the biggest economic indicators in the retail industry”, the writer suggests ________.

A. Wal Mart should remodel its stores

B. Wal Mart should hunt for money

C. Wal Mart works well in the U.S. economy

D. Wal Mart affects economic activity in the U.S. to some extent.

The next morning Alex was waiting in the FMA president’s suite when Jerome Patterton arrived. Alex filled him in quickly on the Jax report. Then he said, “I want you to give an order to the trust department to sell every share of Supranational we’re holding.”
“I won’t!” Patterton’s voice rose. “Who do you think you are, giving orders-----“ “I’ll tell you who I am, Jerome. I’m the guy who warned the board against in-depth involvement with SuNatCo. I fought against heavy trust department buying of the stock, but no one-----including you -----would listen. Now Supranational is caving in.” Alex leaned across the desk and slammed a fist down hard. “Don’t you understand? Supranational can bring this bank down with it.”
Patterton was shaken. “But is SuNatCo in real trouble? Are you sure?”
“If I weren’t, do you think I’d be here? I’m giving you a chance to salvage something at least.” He pointed to his wristwatch. “It’s an hour since the New York  stock market opened. Jerome, get on the phone and give that order!”
Muscles around the bank president’s mouth twitched nervously. Never decisive, strong influence often swayed him. He hesitated, then picked up the telephone.
“Get me Mitchell in the trust department… Mitch? This is Jerome. Listen carefully. I want you to give a sell order immediately on all the Supranational stock we hold… Yes, sell every share.” Patterton listened, then said impatiently, “Yes, I know what it’ll do to the market. And I know it’s irregular.” His eyes sought Alex’s for reassurance. The hand holding the telephone trembled as he said, “There’s no time to hold meetings. So do it! Yes, I accept responsibility.”
He hung up and reached for a glass of water. “The stock is already down. Our selling will depress it more. We’ll be taking a big beating.”
“It’s our clients-----people who trusted us-----who will take the beating. And they’d have taken a bigger one still, if we’d waited. Even now we’re not out of the woods. A week from now the SEC may disallow those sales. They may rule we had inside knowledge that Supranational was about to be bankrupt, which we should have reported and which would have halted trading in the stock.
【小题1】 Alex filled him in quickly on the Jax report. The sentence means:

“A good book for children should simply be a good book in its own right,”says Mollie Hunter. Born and brought up near Edinburgh, Mollie has devoted her talents to writing primarily for young people. She firmly believes that there is and should always be a wider audience for any good book whatever its main market is. In Mollie’s opinion it is necessary to make full use of language and she enjoys telling a story, which is what every writer should be doing, “If you aren’t telling a story, you’re a very dead writer indeed.”she says. With the chief function of a writer being to entertain, Mollie is indeed an entertainer. “I have this great love of not only the meaning of language but of the music of language,”she says. “This love goes back to early childhood. I’ve told stories all my life. I had a school teacher who used to ask us what we would like to be when we grew up and, because my family always had dogs, and I was very good at handling them. I said I wanted to work with dogs, and the teacher always said‘Nonsense, Mollie; dear, you’ll be a writer.’So finally I thought that this woman must have something, since she was a good teacher and I decided when I was nine that I would be a writer.”

   This childhood intention is described in her novel, A Sound of Chariots, which although written in the third person is clearly autobiographical (自传体的)and gives a picture both of Mollie’s ambition and her struggle towards its achievement. Thoughts of her childhood inevitably(不可避免的)brought thoughts of the time when her home was still a village with buttercup meadows and strawberry fields-sadly now covered with modern houses. “I was once taken back to see it and I felt that somebody had lain dirty hands all over my childhood. I’ll never go back,”she said.“Never.”“When I set one of my books in Scotland,”she said,“I can recall my romantic feelings as a child playing in those fields, or watching the village blacksmith at work. And that’s important, because children now know so much so early that romance can’t exist for them, as it did for us.”

What does Mollie Hunter feel about the nature of a good book?

A. It should not aim at a narrow audience.

B. It should be attractive to young readers.

C. It should be based on original ideas.

D. It should not include too much conversation.

In Mollie Hunter’s opinion, which of the following is one sign of poor writer?

A. Being poor in life experience

B. Being short of writing skill.

C. The weakness of description

D. The absence of a story.

What do we learn about Mollie Hunter as a young child？

A. She didn’t expect to become a writer.

B. She didn’t enjoy writing stories.

C. She didn’t have any particular ambition.

D. She didn’t respect her teacher’s view.

In comparison with children of earlier years, Mollie feels that children now are _____.

A. more intelligent

B. better informed

C. less eager to learn

D. less interested in reality

What’s the writer’s purpose in this text?

A. To share her enjoyment of Mollie Hunter’s book.

B. To introduce Mollie Hunter’s work to a wider audience.

C. To provide information for Mollie Hunter’s existing readers.

D. To describe Mollie Hunter’s most successful books.