reading

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Unit 19 Modern agriculture
reading

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1?Look at the pictures and compare
traditional and modern farming?2?What are the
advantages and disadvantages of each way ?
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Old way Modern way





In the first picture
A chicken / A hen.
In the second picture
A farmer feeding chickens.
In the third picture
A modern chicken farm.
A farmer can only keep a few chickens.
A factory can keep thou-sands of chickens.
It cost a lot to start a factory.
It cost only a little money.
What are the differences? Compare the old and
the modern ways of raising chickens.
dont have many problems
if ill, many die or are killed
They dont taste so delicious.
The eggs and meat are tasty.
The chickens are free.
not free, can sit in small cages
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Natural Fertilizer Chemical Fertilizer





In the first picture
A pile of animal shit (manure)
It is free or cost very little.
It is expensive to buy.
In the second picture
A bag of chemical fertilizer.
It is easy to be put into the fields.
It needs lots of work to be made.
What are the differences? Compare the old and
the modern ways of feeding the crops.
It usually has a bad smell.
It usually has no smell.
It takes little place to store.
It needs a lot of place to store.
It is difficult to carry and move.
It is easy to transport.
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Using Animals Using Machines





In the first picture
terraced field.
A farmer is ploughing the field with an animal.
cheap to own and to keep
expensive to buy and to use
In the second picture
They result in pollution.
They do not pollute the air.
Farmers use the tractor to work the land.
In the third picture
They can be used in dif-ferent places
They can only be used on flat and dry land.
They dont need rest too often.
They need rest now and then.
What are the differences? Compare the
old and the modern ways of ploughing the fields.
They can be food when they are old.
They can be sold to steel factories when broken.
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Natural Climate Controlled Climate





In the first picture
Terraced fields.
In the second picture
Dry barren farmland.
in bad weather, crops lost
climate controlled, less damage
In the third picture
Irrigated farmland.
The landscape loses its natural beauty.
The landscape is more beautiful.
In the fourth picture
Greenhouses.
Only arable land can grow crops.
Greenhouses can be built almost everywhere.
What are the differences? Compare the old and
the modern ways of irrigation.
If there is a power failure, you may lose crops.
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3?What other changes have happened on farms in
the last 100 years?
Over the last 100 years there have been some
changes on farms and in agriculture The use of
machines, the use of chemical fertilizers, the
use of insect killers, the use of food
supplements in animal feed, the growth of the
farms(bigger farms), doing the work with workers
who are not part of family, growing different
crops,etc.
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1. China has only about 670 ,000 sq. km of arable
land 2 No advanced
technical information was brought in from abroad
before 1980.
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Scientists have always tried to increase
farming production without harming the
environment since the early 1990s.
4Traditional methods of
farming have no advantages so they wont be used
in future agriculture.
5 The average arable
land for each Chinese is much less than that of
the world.

6 Growing vegetables in green
houses has so many advantages that it can
reduce losses caused by bad weather and that
it can partly settle the problem of the
shortage of arable land.

7 GM is a new technique that can
make a plant quite different from what it used to
be, bigger and healthier and with no diseases,
but it takes longer time to grow
8. The GM technique can only
be used on plants, but not on animals at the
present time.
T
F
T
F
T
T
F
F
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Read the whole text .Find out the topic
sentence in each paragraph.
Para.1 For thousands of years traditional
agriculture in China did not change very much.
Para.2 Over time, many farming techniques have
been modernised.
Para.3 Not only is food production important but
also taking care of the environment.
Para.4 Using the latest technologies, Chinese
scientists grow vegetables in greenhouses.
Para.5 Another technique tries to create plants
that produce more and bigger fruit.
Para.6 Nearly 4,500 different plants are
genetically modified.
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Divide the text into 4 parts and find the main
idea of each part
The 1st part the first paragraph
The 2st part the second paragraph
The 3st part the third paragraph
The 4st part the fourth, fifth and sixth
paragraphs.
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Paragraph 1
Traditional agriculture in China.
The development of agriculture before the 1980s.
Paragraph 2
New techniques to protect environ-ment as well as
increasing produs-tion from the 1990s.
Paragraph 3
Ways to solve the problem of the shortage of
arable land.
Part4
1. Grow vegetables in greenhouses.
2. Use GM to create plants that
produce more and bigger and better crops.
What are the ways?
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1.It is that It is on this arable land
that the farmers produce food It was from
the early 1990s that scientists started to
develop 2.asas possible. ??? We need to
deliver the letter as soon as possible. 3.where
possible Fill in the words in the blankets
where possible. Come to see her when
possible. 4.as well as ?,?? He can speak
English as well as French. 5.not onlybut
also nor/neither/so/there/here/only????/?????
??????
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Not only but also??????????? Not only he
but also I have kept the secret. Not only??but
also??? ????? Not only is he busy,but also
I have a lot of work to do. 6.stand for USA
stands for the United States of America. 7.a
variety of ?????(various) She showed a variety
of flowers. She showed various flowers.
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DiscussionHow would you like to change
fruit,vegetable Or animals using GM?
Kind How would you change it Why do you want to change it in this way?
Fruit Watermelon Grow them like block instead of balls Easier to store,take less space
Vegetable Onion Make sure they dont hurt our eyes Easier to peel and cut
Animal Sheep To have red wool Look funny and we dont need to dye it
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Fertiliser fertilise
fertile Production produce
productive Protection protect
protected Modification modify
modified
1.modified 2.protecting protection 3.fertile
fertilisers 4.produce productive
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Grammar The Use of It for Emphasis

• It is / was that / who (whom)
• I saw John in the street this morning.
• It was I who/that saw John in the street this
  morning. (????)
• It was John that/whom I saw in the street this
  morning. (????)
• It was in the street that I saw John this
  morning. (??????)
• It was this morning that I saw John in the
  street. (??????)