2005年5月三級筆譯實務(wù)真題

Section 1 English-Chinese Translation (英譯漢) (60 points)

The importance of agriculture cannot be overstated. More than 50 percent of the world's labor force is employed in agriculture. The distribution in the early 1980s ranged from 67 percent of those employed in Africa to less than 5 percent in North America. In Western Europe, the figure was about 16 percent; in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union, about 32 percent; and in Asia, about 68 percent.

Farm size varies widely from region to region. Recently the average for Canadian farms was about 186 ha (about 460 acres) per farm, and for U.S. farms, about 175 ha (about 432 acres). The average size of a single landholding in the Philippines, however, may be somewhat less than 3.6 ha (less than 9 acres), and in Indonesia, a little less than 1.2 ha (less than 3 acres).

Size also depends on the purpose of the farm. Commercial farming, or production for cash, is usually done on large holdings. The plantations of Latin America are large, privately owned estates worked by tenant labor. Single-crop plantations produce tea, rubber, cocoa. Wheat farms are most efficient when they comprise some thousands of hectares and can be worked by teams of people and machines. Australian sheep stations and other livestock farms must be large to provide grazing for thousands of animals.

Individual subsistence farms or small-family mixed-farm operations are decreasing in number in developed countries but are still numerous in the developing countries of Africa and Asia. A "back-to-the-land" movement in the U.S. reversed the decline of small farms in New England and Alaska in the decade from 1970 to 1980.

The conditions that determine what will be raised in an area include climate, water supply, and terrain.

Over the 10,000 years since agriculture began to be developed, peoples everywhere have discovered the food value of wild plants and animals and domesticated and bred them. The most important are cereals such as wheat, rice, barley, corn and rye.

Agricultural income is also derived from non-food crops such as rubber, fiber plants, tobacco, and oilseeds used in synthetic chemical compounds. Money is also derived from raising animals for pelt.

Much of the foreign exchange earned by a country may be derived from a single commodity; for example, Sri Lanka depends on tea, Denmark specializes in dairy products, Australia in wool, and New Zealand and Argentina in meat products. In the U.S., wheat has become a major foreign exchange commodity in recent years.

The importance of an individual country as an exporter of agricultural products depends on many variables. Among them is the possibility that the country is too little developed industrially to produce manufactured goods in sufficient quantity or technical sophistication. Such agricultural exporters include Ghana with cocoa, and Myanmar with rice. On the other hand, an exceptionally well-developed country may produce surpluses not needed by its own population; this has been true of the U.S., Canada, and some of the West European countries.

Section 2 Chinese-English Translation (漢譯英) (40 points)

由于西藏地處“世界屋脊”，自然條件惡劣，也由于幾百年落后的封建農(nóng)奴制社會形成的各種社會歷史條件的限制，西藏在全國還屬于不發(fā)達地區(qū)。但是，50年的發(fā)展已經(jīng)極大地改變了其昔日貧窮落后的面貌，西藏人民生活質(zhì)量大大提高。社會經(jīng)濟的發(fā)展極大地豐富了人民的物質(zhì)文化生活。2000年，西藏全區(qū)各族人民已基本擺脫貧困，實現(xiàn)溫飽。部分群眾生活達到了小康水平。隨著人民生活逐步富裕，冰箱、彩電、洗衣機、摩托車、手表等消費品進入了越來越多尋常百姓家。不少富裕起來的農(nóng)牧民蓋起了新房，有的還購買了汽車。西藏目前的人均居住面積處于全國首位。廣播、電視、通信、互聯(lián)網(wǎng)等現(xiàn)代信息傳遞手段已深入到人民群眾的日常生活。絕大多數(shù)地區(qū)的百姓能夠通過收聽收看廣播、電視，了解全國和全世界各地的新聞。當(dāng)?shù)匕傩漳軌蛲ㄟ^電話、電報、傳真或互聯(lián)網(wǎng)等手段獲取信息資料，并與全國和全世界各地取得聯(lián)系。由于缺醫(yī)少藥狀況得到根本改變，人民群眾的健康水平大幅度提高。西藏人均預(yù)期壽命由二十世紀五十年代的35.5歲增加到現(xiàn)在的 67歲。