Reading Comprehension -Test 01

Directions : Read the following passage carefully and answer the questions given below it. Certain words/phrases are given in the passages to help you locate them while answering some of the questions.

Governments have traditionally equated economic progress with steel mills and cement factories. While hundreds of millions of farmers remain mired in poverty. However, fears of food shortage, a rethinking of anti-poverty priorities and the crushing recession in 2008 are causing a dramatic shift in world economic policy in favour of greater support for agriculture.

The last time when the world’s framers felt such love was in the 1970s. At the time, as food prices spiked, there was real concern that the world was facing a crisis in which the planet was simply unable to produce enough grain and meet for an expanding population. Governments across the developing world and international aid organizations plowed investment into agriculture in the early 1970s, while technological breakthroughs, like high-yield strains of important food crops, boosted production. The result was the green Revolution and food production exploded.

But the Green Revolution become a victim of its own success, Food prices plunged by some 60% by the late 1980s from their peak in the mid-1970s. Policy makers and aid workers turned their attention to the poor’s other pressing needs, such as health care and education. Farming got starved of resources and investment. By 2004, aid directed at agriculture sank to 3.5% and “Agriculture lost its glitter”. Also, as consumers in high-growth giants such as China and India became wealthier, they began eating more meat, so grain once used for human consumption got diverted to beef up livestock. By early 2008, panicked buying by importing countries and restrictions slapped on grain exports by some big producers helped drive prices upto heights not seen for three decades. Making matters worse, land and resources got reallocated to produce cash crops such as bio-fuels and the result was that voluminous reserves of grain evaporated. Protests broke out across the emerging world and fierce food riots toppled governments.

This spurred global leaders into action. This made them aware that food security is one of the fundamental issues in the world that has to be dealt with in order to maintain administrative and political stability. This also spurred the US, which traditionally provisioned food aid from American grain surpluses to help needy nations, to move towards investing in farm sectors around the globe to boost productivity. This move helped countries become more productive for themselves and be in a better position to feed their own people.

Africa, which missed out on the first Green Revolution due to poor policy and limited resources, also witnessed a “change’ poverty-fighting method favoured by many policy-makers in Africa was to get farmers off their farms into modern jobs in factories and urban centers. But that strategy proved to be highly insufficient. Income levels in the countryside badly trailed those in cities while the FAO estimated that the number of poor going hungry in 2009 reached an all-time high at more than one billion.

In India, on other hand, with only 40% of its farmland irrigated, entire economic boom currently underway is held hostage by the unpredictable monsoon. With much of India’s farming areas suffering from drought this year, the government will have tough time meeting its economic growth targets. in a report, Goldman sachs predicted that if this year too receives weak rains, it could cause agriculture to contract by 2% this fiscal year, making the government’s 7% GDP growth target look “a bit rich”. Another green revolution is the need of the hour and to make it a reality, the global community still has much backbreaking farm work to do.

Q.1 – What is the author’s main objective in writing the passage?

Governments have traditionally equated economic progress with steel mills and cement factories. While hundreds of millions of farmers remain mired in poverty. However, fears of food shortage, a rethinking of anti-poverty priorities and the crushing recession in 2008 are causing a dramatic shift in world economic policy in favour of greater support for agriculture.

The last time when the world’s framers felt such love was in the 1970s. At the time, as food prices spiked, there was real concern that the world was facing a crisis in which the planet was simply unable to produce enough grain and meet for an expanding population. Governments across the developing world and international aid organizations plowed investment into agriculture in the early 1970s, while technological breakthroughs, like high-yield strains of important food crops, boosted production. The result was the green Revolution and food production exploded.

But the Green Revolution become a victim of its own success, Food prices plunged by some 60% by the late 1980s from their peak in the mid-1970s. Policy makers and aid workers turned their attention to the poor’s other pressing needs, such as health care and education. Farming got starved of resources and investment. By 2004, aid directed at agriculture sank to 3.5% and “Agriculture lost its glitter”. Also, as consumers in high-growth giants such as China and India became wealthier, they began eating more meat, so grain once used for human consumption got diverted to beef up livestock. By early 2008, panicked buying by importing countries and restrictions slapped on grain exports by some big producers helped drive prices upto heights not seen for three decades. Making matters worse, land and resources got reallocated to produce cash crops such as bio-fuels and the result was that voluminous reserves of grain evaporated. Protests broke out across the emerging world and fierce food riots toppled governments.

This spurred global leaders into action. This made them aware that food security is one of the fundamental issues in the world that has to be dealt with in order to maintain administrative and political stability. This also spurred the US, which traditionally provisioned food aid from American grain surpluses to help needy nations, to move towards investing in farm sectors around the globe to boost productivity. This move helped countries become more productive for themselves and be in a better position to feed their own people.

Africa, which missed out on the first Green Revolution due to poor policy and limited resources, also witnessed a “change’ poverty-fighting method favoured by many policy-makers in Africa was to get farmers off their farms into modern jobs in factories and urban centers. But that strategy proved to be highly insufficient. Income levels in the countryside badly trailed those in cities while the FAO estimated that the number of poor going hungry in 2009 reached an all-time high at more than one billion.

In India, on other hand, with only 40% of its farmland irrigated, entire economic boom currently underway is held hostage by the unpredictable monsoon. With much of India’s farming areas suffering from drought this year, the government will have tough time meeting its economic growth targets. in a report, Goldman sachs predicted that if this year too receives weak rains, it could cause agriculture to contract by 2% this fiscal year, making the government’s 7% GDP growth target look “a bit rich”. Another green revolution is the need of the hour and to make it a reality, the global community still has much backbreaking farm work to do.

Q.2 – Which of the following in an adverse impact of the Green Revolution?

Governments have traditionally equated economic progress with steel mills and cement factories. While hundreds of millions of farmers remain mired in poverty. However, fears of food shortage, a rethinking of anti-poverty priorities and the crushing recession in 2008 are causing a dramatic shift in world economic policy in favour of greater support for agriculture.

The last time when the world’s framers felt such love was in the 1970s. At the time, as food prices spiked, there was real concern that the world was facing a crisis in which the planet was simply unable to produce enough grain and meet for an expanding population. Governments across the developing world and international aid organizations plowed investment into agriculture in the early 1970s, while technological breakthroughs, like high-yield strains of important food crops, boosted production. The result was the green Revolution and food production exploded.

But the Green Revolution become a victim of its own success, Food prices plunged by some 60% by the late 1980s from their peak in the mid-1970s. Policy makers and aid workers turned their attention to the poor’s other pressing needs, such as health care and education. Farming got starved of resources and investment. By 2004, aid directed at agriculture sank to 3.5% and “Agriculture lost its glitter”. Also, as consumers in high-growth giants such as China and India became wealthier, they began eating more meat, so grain once used for human consumption got diverted to beef up livestock. By early 2008, panicked buying by importing countries and restrictions slapped on grain exports by some big producers helped drive prices upto heights not seen for three decades. Making matters worse, land and resources got reallocated to produce cash crops such as bio-fuels and the result was that voluminous reserves of grain evaporated. Protests broke out across the emerging world and fierce food riots toppled governments.

This spurred global leaders into action. This made them aware that food security is one of the fundamental issues in the world that has to be dealt with in order to maintain administrative and political stability. This also spurred the US, which traditionally provisioned food aid from American grain surpluses to help needy nations, to move towards investing in farm sectors around the globe to boost productivity. This move helped countries become more productive for themselves and be in a better position to feed their own people.

Africa, which missed out on the first Green Revolution due to poor policy and limited resources, also witnessed a “change’ poverty-fighting method favoured by many policy-makers in Africa was to get farmers off their farms into modern jobs in factories and urban centers. But that strategy proved to be highly insufficient. Income levels in the countryside badly trailed those in cities while the FAO estimated that the number of poor going hungry in 2009 reached an all-time high at more than one billion.

In India, on other hand, with only 40% of its farmland irrigated, entire economic boom currently underway is held hostage by the unpredictable monsoon. With much of India’s farming areas suffering from drought this year, the government will have tough time meeting its economic growth targets. in a report, Goldman sachs predicted that if this year too receives weak rains, it could cause agriculture to contract by 2% this fiscal year, making the government’s 7% GDP growth target look “a bit rich”. Another green revolution is the need of the hour and to make it a reality, the global community still has much backbreaking farm work to do.

Q.3 – What is the author trying to convey through the phrase “making the government’s 7% GDP growth target look ‘a bit rich’?

Governments have traditionally equated economic progress with steel mills and cement factories. While hundreds of millions of farmers remain mired in poverty. However, fears of food shortage, a rethinking of anti-poverty priorities and the crushing recession in 2008 are causing a dramatic shift in world economic policy in favour of greater support for agriculture.

The last time when the world’s framers felt such love was in the 1970s. At the time, as food prices spiked, there was real concern that the world was facing a crisis in which the planet was simply unable to produce enough grain and meet for an expanding population. Governments across the developing world and international aid organizations plowed investment into agriculture in the early 1970s, while technological breakthroughs, like high-yield strains of important food crops, boosted production. The result was the green Revolution and food production exploded.

But the Green Revolution become a victim of its own success, Food prices plunged by some 60% by the late 1980s from their peak in the mid-1970s. Policy makers and aid workers turned their attention to the poor’s other pressing needs, such as health care and education. Farming got starved of resources and investment. By 2004, aid directed at agriculture sank to 3.5% and “Agriculture lost its glitter”. Also, as consumers in high-growth giants such as China and India became wealthier, they began eating more meat, so grain once used for human consumption got diverted to beef up livestock. By early 2008, panicked buying by importing countries and restrictions slapped on grain exports by some big producers helped drive prices upto heights not seen for three decades. Making matters worse, land and resources got reallocated to produce cash crops such as bio-fuels and the result was that voluminous reserves of grain evaporated. Protests broke out across the emerging world and fierce food riots toppled governments.

This spurred global leaders into action. This made them aware that food security is one of the fundamental issues in the world that has to be dealt with in order to maintain administrative and political stability. This also spurred the US, which traditionally provisioned food aid from American grain surpluses to help needy nations, to move towards investing in farm sectors around the globe to boost productivity. This move helped countries become more productive for themselves and be in a better position to feed their own people.

Africa, which missed out on the first Green Revolution due to poor policy and limited resources, also witnessed a “change’ poverty-fighting method favoured by many policy-makers in Africa was to get farmers off their farms into modern jobs in factories and urban centers. But that strategy proved to be highly insufficient. Income levels in the countryside badly trailed those in cities while the FAO estimated that the number of poor going hungry in 2009 reached an all-time high at more than one billion.

In India, on other hand, with only 40% of its farmland irrigated, entire economic boom currently underway is held hostage by the unpredictable monsoon. With much of India’s farming areas suffering from drought this year, the government will have tough time meeting its economic growth targets. in a report, Goldman sachs predicted that if this year too receives weak rains, it could cause agriculture to contract by 2% this fiscal year, making the government’s 7% GDP growth target look “a bit rich”. Another green revolution is the need of the hour and to make it a reality, the global community still has much backbreaking farm work to do.

Q.4 – Which of the following factors was/were responsible for the neglect of the farming sector after the Green Revolution?

(A) Steel and cement sectors generated more revenue for the government as compared agriculture

(B) large-scale protests against favouring agriculture at the cost of other important sectors such as education and health care

(C) Attention of policy-makers and aid organizations was diverted from the agriculture to other sectors

Governments have traditionally equated economic progress with steel mills and cement factories. While hundreds of millions of farmers remain mired in poverty. However, fears of food shortage, a rethinking of anti-poverty priorities and the crushing recession in 2008 are causing a dramatic shift in world economic policy in favour of greater support for agriculture.

The last time when the world’s framers felt such love was in the 1970s. At the time, as food prices spiked, there was real concern that the world was facing a crisis in which the planet was simply unable to produce enough grain and meet for an expanding population. Governments across the developing world and international aid organizations plowed investment into agriculture in the early 1970s, while technological breakthroughs, like high-yield strains of important food crops, boosted production. The result was the green Revolution and food production exploded.

But the Green Revolution become a victim of its own success, Food prices plunged by some 60% by the late 1980s from their peak in the mid-1970s. Policy makers and aid workers turned their attention to the poor’s other pressing needs, such as health care and education. Farming got starved of resources and investment. By 2004, aid directed at agriculture sank to 3.5% and “Agriculture lost its glitter”. Also, as consumers in high-growth giants such as China and India became wealthier, they began eating more meat, so grain once used for human consumption got diverted to beef up livestock. By early 2008, panicked buying by importing countries and restrictions slapped on grain exports by some big producers helped drive prices upto heights not seen for three decades. Making matters worse, land and resources got reallocated to produce cash crops such as bio-fuels and the result was that voluminous reserves of grain evaporated. Protests broke out across the emerging world and fierce food riots toppled governments.

This spurred global leaders into action. This made them aware that food security is one of the fundamental issues in the world that has to be dealt with in order to maintain administrative and political stability. This also spurred the US, which traditionally provisioned food aid from American grain surpluses to help needy nations, to move towards investing in farm sectors around the globe to boost productivity. This move helped countries become more productive for themselves and be in a better position to feed their own people.

Africa, which missed out on the first Green Revolution due to poor policy and limited resources, also witnessed a “change’ poverty-fighting method favoured by many policy-makers in Africa was to get farmers off their farms into modern jobs in factories and urban centers. But that strategy proved to be highly insufficient. Income levels in the countryside badly trailed those in cities while the FAO estimated that the number of poor going hungry in 2009 reached an all-time high at more than one billion.

In India, on other hand, with only 40% of its farmland irrigated, entire economic boom currently underway is held hostage by the unpredictable monsoon. With much of India’s farming areas suffering from drought this year, the government will have tough time meeting its economic growth targets. in a report, Goldman sachs predicted that if this year too receives weak rains, it could cause agriculture to contract by 2% this fiscal year, making the government’s 7% GDP growth target look “a bit rich”. Another green revolution is the need of the hour and to make it a reality, the global community still has much backbreaking farm work to do.

Q.5 – What promoted leaders throughout the world to take action to boost the agriculture sector in 2008?

Governments have traditionally equated economic progress with steel mills and cement factories. While hundreds of millions of farmers remain mired in poverty. However, fears of food shortage, a rethinking of anti-poverty priorities and the crushing recession in 2008 are causing a dramatic shift in world economic policy in favour of greater support for agriculture.

The last time when the world’s framers felt such love was in the 1970s. At the time, as food prices spiked, there was real concern that the world was facing a crisis in which the planet was simply unable to produce enough grain and meet for an expanding population. Governments across the developing world and international aid organizations plowed investment into agriculture in the early 1970s, while technological breakthroughs, like high-yield strains of important food crops, boosted production. The result was the green Revolution and food production exploded.

But the Green Revolution become a victim of its own success, Food prices plunged by some 60% by the late 1980s from their peak in the mid-1970s. Policy makers and aid workers turned their attention to the poor’s other pressing needs, such as health care and education. Farming got starved of resources and investment. By 2004, aid directed at agriculture sank to 3.5% and “Agriculture lost its glitter”. Also, as consumers in high-growth giants such as China and India became wealthier, they began eating more meat, so grain once used for human consumption got diverted to beef up livestock. By early 2008, panicked buying by importing countries and restrictions slapped on grain exports by some big producers helped drive prices upto heights not seen for three decades. Making matters worse, land and resources got reallocated to produce cash crops such as bio-fuels and the result was that voluminous reserves of grain evaporated. Protests broke out across the emerging world and fierce food riots toppled governments.

This spurred global leaders into action. This made them aware that food security is one of the fundamental issues in the world that has to be dealt with in order to maintain administrative and political stability. This also spurred the US, which traditionally provisioned food aid from American grain surpluses to help needy nations, to move towards investing in farm sectors around the globe to boost productivity. This move helped countries become more productive for themselves and be in a better position to feed their own people.

Africa, which missed out on the first Green Revolution due to poor policy and limited resources, also witnessed a “change’ poverty-fighting method favoured by many policy-makers in Africa was to get farmers off their farms into modern jobs in factories and urban centers. But that strategy proved to be highly insufficient. Income levels in the countryside badly trailed those in cities while the FAO estimated that the number of poor going hungry in 2009 reached an all-time high at more than one billion.

In India, on other hand, with only 40% of its farmland irrigated, entire economic boom currently underway is held hostage by the unpredictable monsoon. With much of India’s farming areas suffering from drought this year, the government will have tough time meeting its economic growth targets. in a report, Goldman sachs predicted that if this year too receives weak rains, it could cause agriculture to contract by 2% this fiscal year, making the government’s 7% GDP growth target look “a bit rich”. Another green revolution is the need of the hour and to make it a reality, the global community still has much backbreaking farm work to do.

Q.6 – What motivated the US to focus on investing in agriculture across the globe?

Governments have traditionally equated economic progress with steel mills and cement factories. While hundreds of millions of farmers remain mired in poverty. However, fears of food shortage, a rethinking of anti-poverty priorities and the crushing recession in 2008 are causing a dramatic shift in world economic policy in favour of greater support for agriculture.

The last time when the world’s framers felt such love was in the 1970s. At the time, as food prices spiked, there was real concern that the world was facing a crisis in which the planet was simply unable to produce enough grain and meet for an expanding population. Governments across the developing world and international aid organizations plowed investment into agriculture in the early 1970s, while technological breakthroughs, like high-yield strains of important food crops, boosted production. The result was the green Revolution and food production exploded.

But the Green Revolution become a victim of its own success, Food prices plunged by some 60% by the late 1980s from their peak in the mid-1970s. Policy makers and aid workers turned their attention to the poor’s other pressing needs, such as health care and education. Farming got starved of resources and investment. By 2004, aid directed at agriculture sank to 3.5% and “Agriculture lost its glitter”. Also, as consumers in high-growth giants such as China and India became wealthier, they began eating more meat, so grain once used for human consumption got diverted to beef up livestock. By early 2008, panicked buying by importing countries and restrictions slapped on grain exports by some big producers helped drive prices upto heights not seen for three decades. Making matters worse, land and resources got reallocated to produce cash crops such as bio-fuels and the result was that voluminous reserves of grain evaporated. Protests broke out across the emerging world and fierce food riots toppled governments.

This spurred global leaders into action. This made them aware that food security is one of the fundamental issues in the world that has to be dealt with in order to maintain administrative and political stability. This also spurred the US, which traditionally provisioned food aid from American grain surpluses to help needy nations, to move towards investing in farm sectors around the globe to boost productivity. This move helped countries become more productive for themselves and be in a better position to feed their own people.

Africa, which missed out on the first Green Revolution due to poor policy and limited resources, also witnessed a “change’ poverty-fighting method favoured by many policy-makers in Africa was to get farmers off their farms into modern jobs in factories and urban centers. But that strategy proved to be highly insufficient. Income levels in the countryside badly trailed those in cities while the FAO estimated that the number of poor going hungry in 2009 reached an all-time high at more than one billion.

In India, on other hand, with only 40% of its farmland irrigated, entire economic boom currently underway is held hostage by the unpredictable monsoon. With much of India’s farming areas suffering from drought this year, the government will have tough time meeting its economic growth targets. in a report, Goldman sachs predicted that if this year too receives weak rains, it could cause agriculture to contract by 2% this fiscal year, making the government’s 7% GDP growth target look “a bit rich”. Another green revolution is the need of the hour and to make it a reality, the global community still has much backbreaking farm work to do.

Q.7 – What impact did the economic recession of 2008 have on agriculture?

Governments have traditionally equated economic progress with steel mills and cement factories. While hundreds of millions of farmers remain mired in poverty. However, fears of food shortage, a rethinking of anti-poverty priorities and the crushing recession in 2008 are causing a dramatic shift in world economic policy in favour of greater support for agriculture.

The last time when the world’s framers felt such love was in the 1970s. At the time, as food prices spiked, there was real concern that the world was facing a crisis in which the planet was simply unable to produce enough grain and meet for an expanding population. Governments across the developing world and international aid organizations plowed investment into agriculture in the early 1970s, while technological breakthroughs, like high-yield strains of important food crops, boosted production. The result was the green Revolution and food production exploded.

But the Green Revolution become a victim of its own success, Food prices plunged by some 60% by the late 1980s from their peak in the mid-1970s. Policy makers and aid workers turned their attention to the poor’s other pressing needs, such as health care and education. Farming got starved of resources and investment. By 2004, aid directed at agriculture sank to 3.5% and “Agriculture lost its glitter”. Also, as consumers in high-growth giants such as China and India became wealthier, they began eating more meat, so grain once used for human consumption got diverted to beef up livestock. By early 2008, panicked buying by importing countries and restrictions slapped on grain exports by some big producers helped drive prices upto heights not seen for three decades. Making matters worse, land and resources got reallocated to produce cash crops such as bio-fuels and the result was that voluminous reserves of grain evaporated. Protests broke out across the emerging world and fierce food riots toppled governments.

This spurred global leaders into action. This made them aware that food security is one of the fundamental issues in the world that has to be dealt with in order to maintain administrative and political stability. This also spurred the US, which traditionally provisioned food aid from American grain surpluses to help needy nations, to move towards investing in farm sectors around the globe to boost productivity. This move helped countries become more productive for themselves and be in a better position to feed their own people.

Africa, which missed out on the first Green Revolution due to poor policy and limited resources, also witnessed a “change’ poverty-fighting method favoured by many policy-makers in Africa was to get farmers off their farms into modern jobs in factories and urban centers. But that strategy proved to be highly insufficient. Income levels in the countryside badly trailed those in cities while the FAO estimated that the number of poor going hungry in 2009 reached an all-time high at more than one billion.

In India, on other hand, with only 40% of its farmland irrigated, entire economic boom currently underway is held hostage by the unpredictable monsoon. With much of India’s farming areas suffering from drought this year, the government will have tough time meeting its economic growth targets. in a report, Goldman sachs predicted that if this year too receives weak rains, it could cause agriculture to contract by 2% this fiscal year, making the government’s 7% GDP growth target look “a bit rich”. Another green revolution is the need of the hour and to make it a reality, the global community still has much backbreaking farm work to do.

Q.8 – What encouraged African policy-makers to focus on urban jobs?

Governments have traditionally equated economic progress with steel mills and cement factories. While hundreds of millions of farmers remain mired in poverty. However, fears of food shortage, a rethinking of anti-poverty priorities and the crushing recession in 2008 are causing a dramatic shift in world economic policy in favour of greater support for agriculture.

The last time when the world’s framers felt such love was in the 1970s. At the time, as food prices spiked, there was real concern that the world was facing a crisis in which the planet was simply unable to produce enough grain and meet for an expanding population. Governments across the developing world and international aid organizations plowed investment into agriculture in the early 1970s, while technological breakthroughs, like high-yield strains of important food crops, boosted production. The result was the green Revolution and food production exploded.

But the Green Revolution become a victim of its own success, Food prices plunged by some 60% by the late 1980s from their peak in the mid-1970s. Policy makers and aid workers turned their attention to the poor’s other pressing needs, such as health care and education. Farming got starved of resources and investment. By 2004, aid directed at agriculture sank to 3.5% and “Agriculture lost its glitter”. Also, as consumers in high-growth giants such as China and India became wealthier, they began eating more meat, so grain once used for human consumption got diverted to beef up livestock. By early 2008, panicked buying by importing countries and restrictions slapped on grain exports by some big producers helped drive prices upto heights not seen for three decades. Making matters worse, land and resources got reallocated to produce cash crops such as bio-fuels and the result was that voluminous reserves of grain evaporated. Protests broke out across the emerging world and fierce food riots toppled governments.

This spurred global leaders into action. This made them aware that food security is one of the fundamental issues in the world that has to be dealt with in order to maintain administrative and political stability. This also spurred the US, which traditionally provisioned food aid from American grain surpluses to help needy nations, to move towards investing in farm sectors around the globe to boost productivity. This move helped countries become more productive for themselves and be in a better position to feed their own people.

Africa, which missed out on the first Green Revolution due to poor policy and limited resources, also witnessed a “change’ poverty-fighting method favoured by many policy-makers in Africa was to get farmers off their farms into modern jobs in factories and urban centers. But that strategy proved to be highly insufficient. Income levels in the countryside badly trailed those in cities while the FAO estimated that the number of poor going hungry in 2009 reached an all-time high at more than one billion.

In India, on other hand, with only 40% of its farmland irrigated, entire economic boom currently underway is held hostage by the unpredictable monsoon. With much of India’s farming areas suffering from drought this year, the government will have tough time meeting its economic growth targets. in a report, Goldman sachs predicted that if this year too receives weak rains, it could cause agriculture to contract by 2% this fiscal year, making the government’s 7% GDP growth target look “a bit rich”. Another green revolution is the need of the hour and to make it a reality, the global community still has much backbreaking farm work to do.

Q.9 – Which of the following had contributed to exorbitant food prices in 2008?

(A) Hoarding of foods stocks by local wholesalers, which inadvertently created a food shortage

(B) Exports of foodgrains was reduce by large producers

(C) Diverting resources from cultivation of foodgrains to that of more profitable crops.

Governments have traditionally equated economic progress with steel mills and cement factories. While hundreds of millions of farmers remain mired in poverty. However, fears of food shortage, a rethinking of anti-poverty priorities and the crushing recession in 2008 are causing a dramatic shift in world economic policy in favour of greater support for agriculture.

The last time when the world’s framers felt such love was in the 1970s. At the time, as food prices spiked, there was real concern that the world was facing a crisis in which the planet was simply unable to produce enough grain and meet for an expanding population. Governments across the developing world and international aid organizations plowed investment into agriculture in the early 1970s, while technological breakthroughs, like high-yield strains of important food crops, boosted production. The result was the green Revolution and food production exploded.

But the Green Revolution become a victim of its own success, Food prices plunged by some 60% by the late 1980s from their peak in the mid-1970s. Policy makers and aid workers turned their attention to the poor’s other pressing needs, such as health care and education. Farming got starved of resources and investment. By 2004, aid directed at agriculture sank to 3.5% and “Agriculture lost its glitter”. Also, as consumers in high-growth giants such as China and India became wealthier, they began eating more meat, so grain once used for human consumption got diverted to beef up livestock. By early 2008, panicked buying by importing countries and restrictions slapped on grain exports by some big producers helped drive prices upto heights not seen for three decades. Making matters worse, land and resources got reallocated to produce cash crops such as bio-fuels and the result was that voluminous reserves of grain evaporated. Protests broke out across the emerging world and fierce food riots toppled governments.

This spurred global leaders into action. This made them aware that food security is one of the fundamental issues in the world that has to be dealt with in order to maintain administrative and political stability. This also spurred the US, which traditionally provisioned food aid from American grain surpluses to help needy nations, to move towards investing in farm sectors around the globe to boost productivity. This move helped countries become more productive for themselves and be in a better position to feed their own people.

Africa, which missed out on the first Green Revolution due to poor policy and limited resources, also witnessed a “change’ poverty-fighting method favoured by many policy-makers in Africa was to get farmers off their farms into modern jobs in factories and urban centers. But that strategy proved to be highly insufficient. Income levels in the countryside badly trailed those in cities while the FAO estimated that the number of poor going hungry in 2009 reached an all-time high at more than one billion.

In India, on other hand, with only 40% of its farmland irrigated, entire economic boom currently underway is held hostage by the unpredictable monsoon. With much of India’s farming areas suffering from drought this year, the government will have tough time meeting its economic growth targets. in a report, Goldman sachs predicted that if this year too receives weak rains, it could cause agriculture to contract by 2% this fiscal year, making the government’s 7% GDP growth target look “a bit rich”. Another green revolution is the need of the hour and to make it a reality, the global community still has much backbreaking farm work to do.

Q.10 – Which of the following is true about the state of agriculture in India at present?

(A) Of all the sectors, agriculture needs the highest allocation of funds

(B) Contribution of agriculture to India’s GDP this year would depend greatly upon the monsoon rains

(C) As India is one of the high-growth countries it has surplus food reserves export to other nations

Directions: Choose the word/group of words which is most similar in meaning to the word printed in bold as used in the passage.

Q.11. STARVED

Directions: Choose the word/group of words which is most similar in meaning to the word printed in bold as used in the passage.

Q.12. SLAPPED

Directions: Choose the word/group of words which is most similar in meaning to the word printed in bold as used in the passage.

Q.13. PLOWED

Directions: Choose the word/group of words which is most OPPOSITE in meaning to the word printed in bold as used in the passage.

Q.14. PRESSING

Directions: Choose the word/group of words which is most OPPOSITE in meaning to the word printed in bold as used in the passage.

Q.14. EVAPORATED