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Section 1: English-Chinese Translation(英譯漢)(60 point)
Part A Compulsory Translation (必譯題)
Until recently, scientists knew little about life in the deep sea, nor had they reason to believe that it was being threatened. Now, with the benefit of technology that allows for deeper exploration, researchers have uncovered a remarkable array of species inhabiting the ocean floor at depths of more than 660 feet, or about 200 meters. At the same time, however, technology has also enabled fishermen to reach far deeper than ever before, into areas where bottom trawls can destroy in minutes what has taken nature hundreds and in some cases thousands of years to build.
Many of the world’s coral species, for example, are found at depths of more than 200 meters. It is also estimated that roughly half of the world’s highest seamounts — areas that rise from the ocean floor and are particularly rich in marine life — are also found in the deep ocean.
These deep sea ecosystems provide shelter, spawning and breeding areas for fish and other creatures, as well as protection from strong currents and predators. Moreover, they are believed to harbor some of the most extensive reservoirs of life on earth, with estimates ranging from 500,000 to 100 million species inhabiting these largely unexplored and highly fragile ecosystems.
Yet just as we are beginning to recognize the tremendous diversity of life in these areas, along with the potential benefits newly found species may hold for human society in the form of potential food products and new medicines, they are at risk of being lost forever. With enhanced ability both to identify where these species-rich areas are located and to trawl in deeper water than before, commercial fishing vessels are now beginning to reach down with nets the size of football fields, catching everything in their path while simultaneously crushing fragile corals and breaking up the delicate structure of reefs and seamounts that provide critical habitat to the countless species of fish and other marine life that inhabit the deep ocean floor.
Because deep sea bottom trawling is a recent phenomenon, the damage that has been done is still limited. If steps are taken quickly to prevent this kind of destructive activity from occurring on the high seas, the benefits both to the marine environment and to future generations are incalculable. And they far outweigh the short-term costs to the fishing industry.
Part B Optional Translations (二選一題)(30 points)
Topic 1 (選題一)
Most of the world’s victims of AIDS live — and, at an alarming rate, die — in Africa. The number of people living with AIDS in Africa was estimated at 26.6 million in late 2003. New figures to be published by the United Nations Joint Program on AIDS (UNAIDS)，the special UN agency set up to deal with the pandemic, will probably confirm its continued spread in Africa, but they will also show whether the rate of spread is constant, increasing or falling.
AIDS is most prevalent in Eastern and Southern Africa, with South Africa, Zimbabwe and Kenya having the greatest numbers of sufferers; other countries severely affected include Botswana and Zambia. AIDS was raging in Eastern Africa — where it was called “slim”, after the appearance of victims wasting away — within a few years after its emergence was established in the eastern Congo basin; however, the conflicting theories about the origin of AIDS are highly controversial and politicized, and the controversy is far from being settled.
Measures being taken all over Africa include, first of all, campaigns of public awareness and device, including advice to remain faithful to one sexual partner and to use condoms. The latter advice is widely ignored or resisted owing to natural and cultural aversion to condoms and to Christian and Muslim teaching, which places emphasis instead on self-restraint.
An important part of anti- AIDS campaigns, whether organized by governments, nongovernmental organizations or both, is the extension of voluntary counseling and testing (VCT).In addition, medical research has found a way to help sufferers, though not to cure them.
Funds for anti- AIDS efforts are provided by the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, a partnership between governments, civil society, the private sector and affected communities around the world; the fund was launched following a call by the UN Secretary-General in 2001. However, much more is needed if the spread of the pandemic is to be at least halted.
Topic 2 (選題二)
As a leader of a least developed country, I speak from experience when I say that poverty is too complex a phenomenon, and the strategies for fighting it too diverse and dependent on local circumstances, for there is no single silver bullet in the war on poverty.
We have learned the hard way over the years. We have experimented with all kinds of ideas.
Yet a report recently released by the World Economic Forum shows that barely a third of what should have been done by now to ensure the world meets its goals to fight poverty, hunger and disease by 2015 is done. I am now convinced that the Millennium Development Goals set by the United Nations in 2000 can only be attained through a global compact, anchored in national policies that take into account local circumstances.
Aid and trade are both necessary, but they are not enough on their own. Neither is good governance enough in itself. Above all, nothing can move without the direct participation of local communities. I fear that we lecture too much. This is not the best way.
I will give an example of how such a compact worked in Tanzania to achieve universal basic schooling.
In the mid-1990s, almost all indicators for basic education were in free fall. The gross enrollment rate had fallen from 98 percent in the early 1980s to 77.6 percent in 2000. The net enrollment rate had likewise fallen, from over 80 percent to only 58.8 percent.
Then several things happened. We decided at the top political level that basic education would be a top priority, and adopted a five-year Primary Education Development Plan to achieve universal basic education by 2006 — nine years ahead of the global target.
Good governance produced more government revenues, which quadrupled over the last eight years. In 2001, we received debt relief under the World Bank’s enhanced HIPC (heavily indebted poor countries)Initiative. Subsequently, more donors put aid money directly into our budget or into a pooled fund for the Primary Education Development Program (PEDP).
The government’s political will was evidenced by the fact that over the last five years the share of the national budget going to poverty reduction rose by 130 percent. We abolished school fees in primary schools.
Then we ensured that all PEDP projects are locally determined, planned, owned, implemented and evaluated. This gave the people pride and dignity in what they were doing. After only two years of implementing PEDP, tremendous successes have been achieved.
