Hãy tham khảo IELTS Academic Reading Sample 90 - Delivering the Goods để giúp các bạn biết thêm cấu trúc đề thi IELTS như thế nào, rèn luyện kỹ năng giải bài tập và có thêm tư liệu tham khảo chuẩn bị cho kì thi học kì sắp tới đạt điểm tốt hơn. | DELIVERING THE GOODS The vast expansion in international trade owes much to a revolution in the business of moving freight A International trade is growing at a startling pace. While the global economy has been expanding at a bit over 3 a year the volume of trade has been rising at a compound annual rate of about twice that. Foreign products from meat to machinery play a more important role in almost every economy in the world and foreign markets now tempt businesses that never much worried about sales beyond their nation s borders. B What lies behind this explosion in international commerce The general worldwide decline in trade barriers such as customs duties and import quotas is surely one explanation. The economic opening of countries that have traditionally been minor players is another. But one force behind the import-export boom has passed all but unnoticed the rapidly falling cost of getting goods to market. Theoretically in the world of trade shipping costs do not matter. Goods once they have been made are assumed to move instantly and at no cost from place to place. The real world however is full of frictions. Cheap labour may make Chinese clothing competitive in America but if delays in shipment tie up working capital and cause winter coats to arrive in spring trade may lose its advantages. C At the turn of the 20th century agriculture and manufacturing were the two most important sectors almost everywhere accounting for about 70 of total output in Germany Italy and France and 40-50 in America Britain and Japan. International commerce was therefore dominated by raw materials such as wheat wood and iron ore or processed commodities such as meat and steel. But these sorts of products are heavy and bulky and the cost of transporting them relatively high. D Countries still trade disproportionately with their geographic neighbours. Over time however world output has shifted into goods whose worth is unrelated to their size and weight. Today it is finished .
