Essential strategies and practice techniques for this IELTS Reading question type. Learn how to manage time and improve accuracy.
Originally published December 2022. Last reviewed 3 July 2026.
A. Three striking facts highlight the dramatic shift in recent years in the relative economic balance of “first-world” and “third-world” economies. Last year, according to our estimates, emerging economies produced slightly more than half of world output measured at purchasing-power parity. Second, they also accounted for more than half of the increase in global GDP in current-dollar terms. And third, perhaps most striking of all, the 32 biggest emerging economies grew in both 2004 and 2005. Every previous year during the past three decades saw at least one country in recession – if not a deep crisis. Some economies will inevitably stumble over the coming years, but, thanks to sounder policies, most can look forward to rapid long-term growth. The young emerging economies have grown up in more ways than one.
B. Such happenings are part of the biggest shift in economic strength since the emergence of the United States more than a century ago. As developing countries and the former Soviet bloc have embraced market-friendly economic reforms and opened their borders to trade and investment, more countries are industrialising than ever before and more quickly. During their industrial revolutions, America and Britain took 50 years to double their real incomes per head; today China is achieving that in a single decade. In an open world, it is much easier to catch up by adopting advanced countries’ technology than it is to be an economic leader that has to invent new technologies in order to keep growing. The shift in economic power towards emerging economies is therefore likely to continue. This is returning the world to the sort of state that endured throughout most of its history. People forget that, until the late 19th century, China and India were the world’s two biggest economies and today’s “emerging economies” accounted for the bulk of world production.
C. Many bosses, workers, and politicians in the rich world fear that the success of these newcomers will be at their own expense. However, rich countries will gain more than they lose from the enrichment of others. Fears that the third world will steal rich-world output and jobs are based on the old fallacy that an increase in one country’s output must be at the expense of another’s. But more exports give developing countries more money to spend on imports mainly from developed economies. Faster growth in poor countries is therefore more likely to increase the output of their richer counterparts than to reduce it. The emerging economies are helping to lift world GDP growth at the very time when the rich world’s ageing populations would otherwise cause growth to slow significant redistribution of income.
D. Although stronger growth in emerging economies will make developed count lies as a whole better off, not everybody will be a winner. Globalisation is causing the biggest shift in relative prices (of labour, capital, commodities, and goods) for a century, and this in turn is causing a significant redistribution of income. Low-skilled workers in developed economies are losing out relative to skilled workers. And owners of capital are-grabbing a bigger slice of the cake relative to workers as a whole..
E. As a result of China, India, and the former Soviet Union embracing market capitalism, the global labour force has doubled in size. To the extent that this has made labour more abundant, and capital relatively scarcer, it has put downward pressure on wages relative to the return on capital. Throughout the rich world, profits have surged to record levels as a share of national income, while the workers’ slice has fallen. Hence, Western workers as a whole do not appear to have shared fully in the fruits of globalisation; many low-skilled ones may even be worse off. However, this is only part of the story. Workers’ wages may be squeezed, but as consumers they benefit from lower prices. As shareholders and future pensioners, they stand to gain from a more efficient use of global capital. Competition from emerging economies should also help to spur rich-world productivity growth and thus, average incomes.
F. To the extent that rich economies as a whole gain from the new wealth of emerging ones, governments have more scope to compensate losers. Governments have another vital role to play, too. The intensifying competition from emerging economies makes flexible labour and product markets even more imperative, so as to speed up the shift from old industries to new ones. That is why Europe and Japan cannot afford to drag their heels over reform or leave workers ill equipped to take up tomorrow’s jobs. Developed countries that are quick to abandon declining industries and move upmarket into new industries and services will fare best as the emerging economies come of age. Those that resist change can look forward to years of relative decline. Those that embrace it can best share in the emerging economies’ astonishing new wealth.
Questions 1-4
The text has 6 paragraphs (A – F). Which paragraph contains each of the following pieces of information?
1. Advice for developed countries
2. The reason that it is faster to develop nowadays
3. The fact that in the 30 years before 2004, not all large developing economies grew
4. The fact that domination of the global economy by Western countries is unusual in global history
Questions 5-8
Complete the following sentences using NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS from the text for each gap.
Developing economies can catch up with developed ones faster because they don’t have to (5) ___________. Growth in developing countries helps developed economies because of spending (6) ___________. Capital is being used more efficiently because it is (7)___________. Economic (8) ___________ required in many developed economies.
Questions 9-13
Do the following statements agree with the information given in the Reading Passage? In boxes 9 – 13 on your answer sheet, write TRUE, if the statement agrees with the information FALSE, if the statement contradicts the information NOT GIVEN, if there is no information on this
9. Large developing economies should not have any problems in the future.
10. If one country increases production, another country will have to reduce its production.
11. Globalisation is causing greater differences in income.
12. Low-skilled workers in developed economies are earning less.
Essential strategies and practice techniques for this IELTS Reading question type. Learn how to manage time and improve accuracy.
Originally published December 2022. Last reviewed 3 July 2026.
Mobiles are barred, but passengers can lap away on their laptops to their hearts’ content. Is one really safer than the other? In the US, a Congressional subcommittee grilled airline representatives and regulators about the issue last month. But the committee heard that using cell phones in planes may indeed pose a risk albeit a slight one. This would seem to vindicate the treatment of Manchester oil worker Neil Whitehouse, who was sentenced last summer to a year in jail by a British court for refusing to turn off his mobile phone on a flight home from Madrid. Although he was only typing a message to be sent on landing, not actually making a call, the court decided that hems putting the flight at risk.
A. The potential for problems is certainly there. Modern airliners are packed with electronic devices that control the plane and handle navigation and communications. Each has to meet stringent safeguards to make sure it doesn’t emit radiation that would interfere with other devices in the plane-standards that passengers’ personal electronic devices don’t necessarily meet. Emissions from inside the plane could also interfere with sensitive antennae on the fixed exterior.
B. But despite running a number of studies, Boeing, Airbus and various government agencies haven’t been able to find clear evidence of problems caused by personal electronic devices, including mobile phones. “We’ve done our own studies. We’ve found cell phones actually have no impact on the navigation system,” says Maryanne Greczyn, a spokeswoman for Airbus Industries of North America in Herndon, Virginia, Not do they affect other critical systems, she says. The only impact Airbus found? “Sometimes when a passenger is starting or finishing a phone call, the pilot hears a wry slight beep in the headset,” she says.
C. The best evidence yet of a problem comes from a report released this year by Britain’s Civil Aviation Authority. Its researchers generated simulated cell phone transmissions inside two Boeing aircrafts. They concluded that the transmissions could create signals at a power and frequency that would not affect the latest equipment, but exceeded the safety threshold established in 1984 and might, therefore, affect some of the older equipment on board. This doesn’t mean “mission critical” equipment such as the navigation system and flight controls. But the devices that could be affected, such as smoke detectors and fuel level indicators, could still create serious problems for the flight crew if they malfunction.
D. Many planes still use equipment certified to the older standards, says Dan Hawkes, head of avionics at the CAA’s Safely Regulation Croup. The CAA study doesn’t prove the equipment will actually fail when subjected to the signals but does show there’s a danger. “We’ve taken some of the uncertainty out of these beliefs,” he says. Another study later this year will see if the cellphone signals actually cause devices to fail.
E. In 1996, RTCA, a consultant hired by the Federal Aviation Administration in the US to conduct tests, determined that potential problems from personal electronic devices were “low”. Nevertheless, it recommended a ban on their use during “critical” periods of flight, such as take-off and landing. RTCA didn’t actually test cell phones, but nevertheless recommended their wholesale ban on flights. But if “better safe than sorry” is the current policy, it’s applied inconsistently, according to Marshall Cross, the chairman of Mega Wave Corporation, based in Boylston, Massachusetts. Why are cell phones outlawed when no one considers a ban on laptops? “It’s like most things in life. The reason is a little bit technical, a little bit economic and a little bit political,” says Cross.
F. The company wrote a report for the FAA in 1998 saying it is possible to build an on-board system that can detect dangerous signals from electronic devices. But Cross’s personal conclusion is that mobile phones aren’t the real threat. “You’d have to stretch things pretty far to figure out how a cell phone could interfere with a plane’s systems,” he says. Cell phones transmit in ranges of around 400, 800 or 1800 megahertz. Since no important piece of aircraft equipment operates at those frequencies, the possibility of interference is very low, Cross says. The use of computers and electronic game systems is much more worrying, lie says. They can generate very strong signals at frequencies that could interfere with plane electronics, especially if a mouse is attached (the wire operates as an antenna) or if their built-in shielding is somehow damaged. Some airlines are even planning to put sockets for laptops in seatbacks.
G. There’s fairly convincing anecdotal evidence that some personal electronic devices have interfered with systems. Aircrew on one flight found that the autopilot was being disconnected, and narrowed the problem down to a passenger’s portable computer. They could actually watch the autopilot disconnect when they switched the computer on. Boeing bought the computer, took it to the airline’s labs and even tested it on an empty flight. But as with every other reported instance of interference, technicians were unable to replicate the problem.
H. Some engineers, however, such as Bruce Donham of Boeing, says that common sense suggests phones are more risky than laptops. “A device capable of producing a strong emission is not as safe as a device which does not have any intentional emission,” he says. Nevertheless, many experts think it’s illogical that cell phones are prohibited when computers aren’t. Besides, the problem is more complicated than simply looking at power and frequency. In the air, the plane operates in a soup of electronic emissions, created by its own electronics and by ground-based radiation. Electronic devices in the cabin-especially those emitting a strong signal-can behave unpredictably, reinforcing other signals, for instance, or creating unforeseen harmonics that disrupt systems.
I. Despite the Congressional subcommittee hearings last month, no one seems to be working seriously on a technical solution that would allow passengers to use their phones. That’s mostly because no one -besides cell phone users themselves stand to gain a lot if the phones are allowed in the air. Even the cell phone companies don’t want it. They are concerned that airborne signals could cause problems by flooding a number of the networks’ base stations at once with the same signal. This effect, called bigfooting, happens because airborne cell phone signals tend to go to many base stations at once, unlike land calls which usually go to just one or two stations. In the US, even if FAA regulations didn’t prohibit cell phones in the air, Federal Communications Commission regulations would.
J. Possible solutions might be to enhance airliners’ electronic insulation or to fit detectors which warned flight staff when passenger devices were emitting dangerous signals. But Cross complains that neither the FAA, the airlines, nor the manufacturers are showing much interest in developing these. So despite Congressional suspicions and the occasional irritated (or jailed) mobile user, the industry’s “better safe than sorry” policy on mobile phones seems likely to continue. In the absence of firm evidence that the international airline industry is engaged in a vast conspiracy to overcharge its customers, a delayed phone call seems a small price to pay for even the tiniest reduction in the chances of a plane crash. But you’ll still be allowed to use your personal computer during a flight. And while that remains the case, airlines can hardly claim that logic has prevailed.
Questions 1-4
Complete the following summary of the paragraphs of Reading Passage. Use no more than three words from the Reading Passage for each answer. Write your answers in boxes 1-4 on your answer sheet.
The would-be risk surely exists, since the avionic systems on modern aircraft are used to manage flight and deal with 1 ___________. Those devices are designed to meet the safety criteria which should be free from interrupting 2 ___________. The personal use of a mobile phone may cause the sophisticated 3 ___________ outside of the plane to dysfunction. Though definite interference in piloting devices has not been scientifically testified, the devices such as those which detect 4 ___________or indicate fuel load could be affected.
Questions 5-9
Use the information in the passage to match the Organization (listed A-E) with opinions or deeds below. Write the appropriate letters A-E in boxes 5-9 on your answer sheet.
A British Civil Aviation Authority
B Maryanne Greczyn
C RTCA
D Marshall Cross
E Boeing company
5 Mobile usages should be forbidden in specific time.
6 Computers are more dangerous than cell phones.
7 Finding that the mobile phones pose little risk on flight’s navigation devices.
8 The disruption of laptops is not as dangerous as cell phones.
9 The mobile signal may have an impact on earlier devices.
Questions 10-13
Do the following statements agree with the information given in the Reading Passage? In boxes 10-13 on your answer sheet, write TRUE, if the statement is true FALSE, if the statement is false NOT GIVEN, if the information is not given in the passage
10 Almost all scientists accept that cell phones have higher emission than that of personal computers.
11 Some people believe that radio emission will interrupt the equipment on the plane.
12 The signal interference-detecting device has not yet been developed because they are in priority for neither the administrative department nor offer an economic incentive.
13 The FAA initiated open debate with the Federal Communications Commission.
Essential strategies and practice techniques for this IELTS Reading question type. Learn how to manage time and improve accuracy.
Originally published December 2022. Last reviewed 3 July 2026.
Today they are everywhere. Production lines controlled by computers and operated by robots. There’s no chatter of assembly workers, just the whirr and click of machines. In the mid-1940s, the workerless factory was still the stuff of science fiction. There were no computers to speak of and electronics was primitive. Yet hidden away in the English countryside was a highly automated production line called ECME, which could turn out 1500 radioreceivers a day with almost no help from human hands.
A. John Sargrove, the visionary engineer who developed the technology, was way ahead of his time. For more than a decade, Sargrove had been trying to figure out how to make cheaper radios. Automating the manufacturing process would help. But radios didn’t lend themselves to such methods: there were too many parts to fit together and too many wires to solder. Even a simple receiver might have 30 separate components and 80 hand-soldered connections. At every stage, things had to be tested and inspected. Making radios required highly skilled labour—and lots of it.
B. In 1944, Sargrove came up with the answer. His solution was to dispense with most of the fiddly bits by inventing a primitive chip—a slab of Bakelite with all the receiver’s electrical components and connections embedded in it. This was something that could be made by machines, and he designed those too. At the end of the war, Sargrove built an automatic production line, which he called ECME (electronic circuit-making equipment), in a small factory in Effingham, Surrey.
C. An operator sat at one end of each ECME line, feeding in die plates. She didn’t need much skill, only quick hands. From now on, everything was controlled by electronic switches and relays. First stop was the sandblaster, which roughened the surface of the plastic BO that molten metal would stick to it The plates were then cleaned to remove any traces of grit The machine automatically checked that the surface was rough enough before sending the plate to the spraying section. There, eight nozzles rotated into position and sprayed molten zinc over both sides of the plate. Again, the nozzles only began to spray when a plate was in place. The plate whizzed on. The next stop was the milling machine, which ground away the surface layer of metal to leave the circuit and other components in the grooves and recesses. Now the plate was a composite of metal and plastic. It sped on to be lacquered and have its circuits tested. By the time it emerged from the end of the line, robot hands had fitted it with sockets to attach components such as valves and loudspeakers. When ECME was working flat out; the whole process took 20 seconds.
D. ECME was astonishingly advanced. Electronic eyes, photocells that generated a small current when a panel arrived, triggered each step in the operation, BO avoiding excessive wear and tear on the machinery. The plates were automatically tested at each stage as they moved along the conveyor. And if more than two plates in succession were duds, the machines were automatically adjusted—or if necessary halted In a conventional factory, I workers would test faulty circuits and repair them. But Sargrove’s assembly line produced circuits so cheaply they just threw away the faulty ones. Sargrove’s circuit board was even more astonishing for the time. It predated the more familiar printed circuit, with wiring printed on aboard, yet was more sophisticated. Its built-in components made it more like a modem chip.
E. When Sargrove unveiled his invention at a meeting of the British Institution of Radio Engineers in February 1947, the assembled engineers were impressed. So was the man from The Times. ECME, he reported the following day, “produces almost without human labour, a complete radio receiving set. This new method of production can be equally well applied to television and other forms of electronic apparatus.
F. The receivers had many advantages over their predecessors, wit components they were more robust. Robots didn’t make the sorts of mistakes human assembly workers sometimes did. “Wiring mistakes just cannot happen,” wrote Sargrove. No w ừ es also meant the radios were lighter and cheaper to ship abroad. And with no soldered wires to come unstuck, the radios were more reliable. Sargrove pointed out that the drcuit boards didn’t have to be flat. They could be curved, opening up the prospect of building the electronics into the cabinet of Bakelite radios.
G. Sargrove was all for introducing this type of automation to other products. It could be used to make more complex electronic equipment than radios, he argued. And even if only part of a manufacturing process were automated, the savings would be substantial. But while his invention was brilliant, his timing was bad. ECME was too advanced for its own good. It was only competitive on huge production runs because each new job meant retooling the machines. But disruption was frequent. Sophisticated as it was, ECME still depended on old- fashioned electromechanical relays and valves—which failed with monotonous regularity. The state of Britain’s economy added to Sargrove’s troubles. Production was dogged by power cuts and post-war shortages of materials. Sargrove’s financial backers began to get cold feet.
H. There was another problem Sargrove hadn’t foreseen. One of ECME’s biggest advantages—the savings on the cost of labour—also accelerated its downfall. Sargrove’s factory had two ECME production lines to produce the two c ữ cuits needed for each radio. Between them these did what a thousand assembly workers would otherwise have done. Human hands were needed only to feed the raw material in at one end and plug the valves into then sockets and fit the loudspeakers at the other. After that, the only job left was to fit the pair of Bakelite panels into a radio cabinet and check that it worked.
I. Sargrove saw automation as the way to solve post-war labour shortages. With somewhat Utopian idealism, he imagined his new technology would free people from boring, repetitive jobs on the production line and allow them to do more interesting work. “Don’t get the idea that we are out to rob people of then jobs,” he told the Daily Mnror. “Our task is to liberate men and women from being slaves of machines.”
J. The workers saw things differently. They viewed automation in the same light as the everlasting light bulb or the suit that never wears out—as a threat to people’s livelihoods. If automation spread, they wouldn’t be released to do more exciting jobs. They’d be released to join the dole queue. Financial backing for ECME fizzled out. The money dried up. And Britain lost its lead in a technology that would transform industry just a few years later.
QUESTIONS
Questions 1-7
Summary
The following diagram explains the process of ECME:
Complete the following chart of the paragraphs of Reading Passage, using no more than two words from the Reading Passage for each answer. Write your answers in boxes1-7on your answer sheet:
Questions 8-11
Complete the following summary of the paragraphs of Reading Passage. using NO more than two words from the Reading Passage for each answer. Write your answers in boxes 8-11 on your answer sheet
Summary
Sargrove had been dedicated to create a 8___________radio by automation of manufacture. The old version of radio had a large number of independent 9___________After this innovation was made, wireless-style radios became 10___________and inexpensive to export overseas. As Sargrove saw it, the real benefit of ECME’s radio was that it reduced 11___________of manual work; which can be easily copied to other industries of manufacturing electronic devices.
Questions 12-13
Choose the correct letter A, B, C or D.
Write your answers inboxes 12-13 on your answer sheet</div>
12. What were workers attitude towards ECME Model initially A. Anxious B. Welcoming C. Boring D. Inspiring
13. What is the main idea of this passage? A. Approach to reduce the price of radio B. A new generation of fully popular products and successful business C. In application of die automation in the early stage D. ECME technology can be applied in many product fields
