Текст 8. HUMAN BEINGS AND THEIR INVIRONMENT

There are a lot of problems facing people on the planet earth nowadays. The problems that demand world action are: the growth of world population, economic crises, and ethnic conflicts.

But the most urgent problem concerning the people of the whole world is an ecological one.

What is ecology? Ecology is the science that studies the conditions of the habitat of man, animals and plants for the benefit of present and future generations.

What is the environment? The environment is everything around us. It includes all living things. It also includes everything that is not alive, such as the soil, the air and the water.

Human activities can make the environment unhealthy. The gasoline burned inside car engines produces gases that poison the air. Factories burn fuels to run machines, and these burning fuels, too, put poisons into the air. Human activities also poison water. Some factories produce liquid wastes that run into rivers. Often, these wastes contain poisons.

Sometimes, useful chemicals cause problems in the environment.

When small animals eat poisoned insects, they take in the chemicals into their cells. When larger animals eat these small animals, the poison is passed on to the larger animals. The larger animals are eaten by still other animals including people.

Many scientists study the environment. When there is a problem, they try to find out why. Then they look for ways to stop the problem.
Scientists have also helped find ways to reduce air and water pollution. New cars burn fuel better and produce fewer poisons. Factories, too, produce fuel poisons. There are laws against dumping poisons into rivers and lakes. People who break these laws should be punished.

Текст 9. BUSINESS GOES GREEN!

Many cities around the world today are heavily polluted. Careless manufacturing, processes employed by some industries and lack of consumer demand for environmentally safe products have contributed to the pollution problem. One result is that millions of tons of glass, paper, plastic, and metal containers are produced, and these are difficult to dispose of.

However, today more and more consumers are choosing “green” and demanding that the products they buy are safe foe the environment. Before they buy a product they ask questions like these: “Will this hairspray damage the ozone layer?” “Is the packaging biodegradable?” “Will it break down in a trash dump?” “Can this metal container be recycled or can it only be used once?”

A recent survey showed that two out of five adults now consider the environmental safety of a product before they buy it. This means that companies must now change the way they make and sell their products to make sure that they are “green”, that is, friendly to the environment.

Only a few years ago, it was impossible to find green products in supermarkets, but now there are hundreds. Some supermarket products carry labels to show that the product is green. Some companies have made the manufacturing of clean and safe products their main selling point and emphasize it in their advertising.

The concern for a safer and cleaner environment is making companies rethink how they do business. No longer will the public accept the old attitude of “Buy it, use it, throw it away, and forget it.” The public pressure is on, and gradually business is cleaning up its act.

Date: 2016-01-03; view: 3866