RichardBurton probably knew nothing of the small South African town of Cullinan whenhe bought yet another chunky diamond for Elizabeth Taylor in 1969. Now theCullinan mine itself, like so many of the diamonds unearthed there, is about tochange hands. On November 22nd De Beers, the diamond giant that has owned themine since 1930, said it was selling it to a consortium led by Petra Diamonds,one of South Africa’s emerging diamond producers, for 1 billion rand in cash. Providedregulators approve the deal, the transfer should take place by the middle ofnext year.

　　De Beers isselling because the mine is no longer profitable, despite attempts to turn itaround. But Petra reckons the mine still has another 20 years of production init and plans to extract at least 1m carats a year. The unexploited"Centenary Cut" deposit, which lies under the existing mine, couldyield a lot more. This is good news for the mine’s 1,000 or so employees and forthe town, which has depended on the diamond business since Sir Thomas Cullinandiscovered a prospect there in 1898 that contained kimberlite, a rock that canbe rich in diamonds. The mine, established in 1903, is one of 30 or sokimberlite diamond mines in the world, and is believed to be still the world’s second-most-valuable diamondresource

　　Petra is arelatively small outfit, listed on London’s Alternative Investment Market,that specialises in buying mines that bigger companies see as marginal. Itstrick is to extract better returns by rationalising production and processing,and keeping operating costs and overheads down. Petra has already bought two ofDe Beers’s loss-making South African mines-both of which are now profitable-and isfinalising the 78.5m rand acquisition of the group’s underground operation in Kimberley,which stopped working in 2005.

　　It alreadyoperates four mines in South Africa and has promising exploration in Angola (ajoint-venture with BHP Billiton), Sierra Leone and Botswana. Petra expects toproduce over 1m carats by 2010-quite a jump from 180,474 carats in the year toJune. The company has yet to make a profit, but expects to be making money bythe middle of next year.

　　In the 1990sDe Beers decided that it was no longer a good idea to try to monopolise thediamond market. It started focusing on higher returns rather than market share,and has been revamping its mine portfolio, selling off mines that are no longerprofitable and investing in more enticing operations, such as its mine off thewest coast of South Africa, its Voorspoed operation in the Free State province,and two new mines in Canada.

　　This hasopened the way for a new class of diamond firm that operates in the vast middleground between the world’s handful of large producers and a multitude of much smaller explorationfirms. The Cullinan deal should entrench Petra in this middle tier, alongsidefirms such as Kimberley Diamond and Trans Hex. But even if it does reach itstarget of 1m carats a year, Petra will still not be able to match the sparkleof the giants. Last year De Beers produced 51m carats from its mines inBotswana, Namibia, South Africa and Tanzania, which amounted to 40% of theworld’s diamonds by value.

　　1. TheCullinan mine was named after_____.

　　[A] theoriginal name of the town

　　[B] the nameof its first owner

　　[C] the nameof its discoverer

　　[D] the nameof the town’s first colonist

　　2. Whichone of the following statements is TRUE of the Cullinan mine?

　　[A] The mineis the only business of the town which employs most of the local residents

　　[B] It can bemined for another 20 years given Petra’s advanced technology

　　[C] It is theworld’s second largest diamond mine with a yearly capacity of 1m carats

　　[D] Whetherthe mine will maintain its profitability is yet to know.

　　3. Petra’s opearting philosophy can be said as _____.

　　[A] to makeprofits by reducing the costs

　　[B] toexploit the surrounding areas of an existing mine

　　[C] tointegrate the resources of all the money-losing small mines

　　[D] torestructure the mine portfolio and to optimize the process management

　　4. De Beershas made changes on its development stratege because_____.

　　[A] it plansto shrink its market share and ends its long-term monopoly

　　[B] it wantsto open the way for the middle tier of diamond market

　　[C] itswitches its attention to making larger profits

　　[D] it wantsto turn around the loss-making mines by cooperating with companies of smallersize.

　　5. Thefuture of the new class of diamond firm is _____.

　　[A] promising

　　[B] dim

　　[C] unknown

　　[D]frustrating

　　文章剖析：

　　文章從Petra公司收購礦產(chǎn)為契因，介紹了鉆石礦業(yè)新興的一個(gè)中間階層。第一段講述了Cullinan礦將要轉(zhuǎn)手的消息;第二段介紹了De Beers公司之所以將礦轉(zhuǎn)手的原因;第三段、第四段介紹Petra公司的一些經(jīng)營方式和情況;第五段講述De Beers公司的運(yùn)營調(diào)整;第六段介紹了鉆石礦業(yè)的新階層。

　　詞匯注釋：

　　chunky adj. 含小而厚的塊：

　　consortium n.財(cái)團(tuán)

　　kimberlite n.金伯利巖

　　entrench v. 確立，使處于牢固地位

　　portfolio n. 組合

　　enticing adj.引誘的, 迷人的, 動(dòng)人心目的

　　難句突破：

　　(1) This is good news for the mine’s 1,000 or so employees and for the town, which has depended on thediamond business since Sir Thomas Cullinan discovered a prospect there in 1898that contained kimberlite, a rock that can be rich in diamonds.

　　[主體句式] This is good news for ...

　　[結(jié)構(gòu)分析] 這是一個(gè)簡單句，for后面的賓語比較復(fù)雜，which 引導(dǎo)的非限定性定語從句修飾the town，在該從句中有一個(gè)since引導(dǎo)的狀語從句;在該狀語從句中，that 引導(dǎo)的定語從句修飾prospect, a rock...是kimberlite的同位語。

　　[句子譯文] 這對于這個(gè)礦的1000名左右的雇工以及這個(gè)小鎮(zhèn)來說是個(gè)好消息，這個(gè)小鎮(zhèn)從1898年Thomas Cullinan爵士發(fā)現(xiàn)該礦含有金伯利巖(可能富含鉆石的一種巖石)后，就一直依賴鉆石生意存活。

　　(2) Itstarted focusing on higher returns rather than market share, and has beenrevamping its mine portfolio, selling off mines that are no longer profitableand investing in more enticing operations, such as its mine off the west coastof South Africa, its Voorspoed operation in the Free State province, and twonew mines in Canada.

　　[主體句式]It started focusing on..., andhas been...

　　[結(jié)構(gòu)分析] 這是一個(gè)并列句，由連詞and 連接，后半分句結(jié)構(gòu)比較復(fù)雜;has been 后面帶有三個(gè)并列的成分，第二個(gè)成分selling off mines后面有that 引導(dǎo)的定語從句，第三個(gè)成分中such as 后面都是用來修飾operations的。

　　[句子譯文] 它開始修關(guān)心更高的回報(bào)率而不是市場份額了，也一直在修改它的礦產(chǎn)組合，賣掉不再盈利的礦產(chǎn)，投資更讓人動(dòng)心的項(xiàng)目，如南非西海岸的礦產(chǎn)、自由州省的Voorspoed項(xiàng)目、加拿大的兩處新礦。

　　題目分析：

　　1. TheCulliman mine in deal was named after_____.1. 正在交易的礦是以_____命名的。

　　[A] theoriginal name of the town[A]小鎮(zhèn)原來的名字

　　[B] the nameof its first owner[B] 第一個(gè)礦主的名字

　　[C] the nameof its discoverer[C] 礦場發(fā)現(xiàn)者的名字

　　[D] the nameof the town’s first colonist[D] 小鎮(zhèn)第一個(gè)殖民者的名字

　　[答案] C

　　[難度系數(shù)] ☆☆

　　[分析] 細(xì)節(jié)題。該礦的名字為Culliman, 從第一段可以看到它所在的小鎮(zhèn)的名字也是這個(gè)，但是第二段提到1898年Thomas Cullinan爵士發(fā)現(xiàn)了這個(gè)礦含有金伯利巖，1903年該礦成立。那么可以推斷，這個(gè)鎮(zhèn)和礦的名字都是以Cullinan爵士、即其第一個(gè)發(fā)現(xiàn)者的名字命名的。因此，正確答案為C。

　　2. Which oneof the following statements is TRUE of the Cullinan mine?2.關(guān)于Cullinan礦，以下的陳述哪個(gè)是正確的?

　　[A] The mineis the only business of the town which employs most of the local residents[A] 該礦山是小鎮(zhèn)大多數(shù)人工作的地方。

　　[B] It can bemined for another 20 years given Petra’s advanced technology[B] 有了Petra的先進(jìn)技術(shù)，該礦山還可以被挖掘20年。

　　[C] It is theworld’s second largest diamond mine with a yearly capacity of 1m carats[C] 它是世界上第二大鉆石礦山，年產(chǎn)鉆石100萬克拉。

　　[D] Whetherthe mine will maintain its profitability is yet to know.[D] 該礦山是否還會保持盈利還是一個(gè)未知數(shù)。

　　[答案]D

　　[難度系數(shù)] ☆☆☆☆

　　[分析] 細(xì)節(jié)題。文章第二段之處小鎮(zhèn)上的大部分人都依賴于鉆石產(chǎn)業(yè)，但這并不意味著他們都在礦山工作，因此A選項(xiàng)錯(cuò)誤。文章第三段談到Petra的盈利策略主要是改進(jìn)流程、降低成本，并沒有強(qiáng)調(diào)使用先進(jìn)的技術(shù)。選項(xiàng)C，在第二段提到Cullinan目前仍被認(rèn)為是世界第二大最有價(jià)值的鉆石礦，但并不一定在規(guī)模上也是第二大的，而且年產(chǎn)量1百萬克拉指的不是該礦山的年產(chǎn)量，而是Petra公司的計(jì)劃年產(chǎn)量。選項(xiàng)D，文章沒有明確指出該礦山將來究竟是否會贏利，因?yàn)椴坏枚�知，答案D為正確的陳述。

　　3. Petra’s opearting philosophy can be saidas _____.3. Petra 的運(yùn)營理念可以說是_____。

　　[A] to makebetter profits by reducing the costs[A] 通過削減成本來取得更好的收益

　　[B] toexploit the surrounding areas of an existing mine[B] 從已經(jīng)存在的礦山周圍尋找資源

　　[C] tointegrate the resources of all the money-losing small mines[C] 整合那些虧損的小礦山的資源

　　[D] torestructure the mine portfolio and to optimize the process management[D] 調(diào)整礦產(chǎn)組合并且優(yōu)化流程管理

　　[答案]A

　　[難度系數(shù)] ☆☆☆☆

　　[分析]推理題。文章第三段提到Petra專門收購大公司邊緣化的礦產(chǎn)，其秘訣就在于通過合理化生產(chǎn)和加工，降低運(yùn)作和管理費(fèi)用來獲得更好的收益。可以看出，公司運(yùn)營理念就是通過自己的努力，比如合理化生產(chǎn)、加工，降低費(fèi)用來盈利，因此，選項(xiàng)A最為符合這一點(diǎn)。

　　4. De Beershas made changes on its development stratege because_____.4. De Beers 改變了自己的發(fā)展戰(zhàn)略因?yàn)開____。

　　[A] it plansto shrink its market share and ends its long-term monopoly[A] 它計(jì)劃縮小其市場份額并中止長期的壟斷

　　[B] it wantsto open the way for the middle tier of diamond market[B] 它希望可以為鉆石市場的中間階層開辟道路

　　[C] itswitches its attention to making larger profits[C] 它的注意力轉(zhuǎn)移到如何謀取更大的利潤

　　[D] it wantsto turn around the loss-making mines by cooperating with companies of smallersize[D] 它想要通過與小規(guī)模公司的合作來扭轉(zhuǎn)那些虧損的礦產(chǎn)

　　[答案]C

　　[難度系數(shù)] ☆☆☆

　　[分析] 推理題。文章第五段提到De Beers 認(rèn)為試圖壟斷市場已經(jīng)不是什么很好的策略了，它開始關(guān)心更高的利潤而不是市場份額了，還采取了一系列的措施來實(shí)現(xiàn)這個(gè)策略。因此，它改變了自己的發(fā)展策略，主要是想要謀取更大的利潤，B為正確答案。A是公司改變策略的方式，B不符合原文內(nèi)容。D選項(xiàng)具有一定的迷惑性，但要注意De Beers知識將一些礦山賣給小公司，這并不意味著它與小公司合作，因此該選項(xiàng)錯(cuò)誤。

　　5. The futureof the new class of diamond firm is _____.5. 鉆石業(yè)新階層的未來會是_____。

　　[A]promising[A] 有前景的

　　[B] dim[B] 暗淡

　　[C]unknown[C] 未知的

　　[D]frustrating[D] 困難重重的

　　[答案]C

　　[難度系數(shù)] ☆

　　[分析]推理題。關(guān)于鉆石業(yè)新出現(xiàn)的中間階層，文章只是介紹了其剛剛開始發(fā)展的情況，但是未來怎么樣文章并沒有給出明確的看法，因此，答案為C，其余三個(gè)選項(xiàng)的態(tài)度顯然不符合題意。