BEST IELTS General Reading Test 409

BEST IELTS General Reading Test 409

IELTS GENERAL READING TEST 409 – PASSAGE – 1

IELTS GENERAL READING TEST – 409

READING PASSAGE – 1

Salinity

It has long been recognized that our land uses, including agricultural development, have significantly changed Australia’s landscapes and natural systems. However, we have not always appreciated the magnitude of change in the soil, water, and nutrient balances, the resultant degradation, and the costs to the wider Australian community. The timeframe for these changes is to be slowed or reversed.

Changes to the Australian landscape have resulted in the widespread and rapidly growing problem of dryland salinity. Farmers were among the first to be affected, by the salinization of rivers and agricultural land. Biodiversity, as well as regional and urban infrastructure, such as water supply, roads and buildings, are now also at risk. Two broad forms of salinity are recognized in Australia.

IELTS General Reading Test

Primary or naturally occurring salinity is part of the Australian landscape and reflects the development of this landscape over time. Examples are the marine plains found around the coastline of Australia and the salt lakes in central and Western Australia. Salts are distributed widely across Australian landscapes.

They originate mainly from depositions of oceanic salt from rain and wind. Salt stored in the soil or groundwater is concentrated through evaporation and transpiration by plants. In a healthy catchment, salt is slowly leached downwards and stored below the root zone, or out of the system.

IELTS General Reading Test

Secondary salinity is the salinization of land and water resources due to land use impacts by people. It includes salinity that results from water table rises from irrigation systems — irrigation salinity, and from dryland management systems — dryland salinity. Both forms of salinity are due to accelerated rising water tables mobilizing salt in the soil. There is no fundamental difference in the hydrologic process.

Where the water balance has been altered due to changing land use (e.g. clearing of native vegetation for broadacre farming or grazing), the excess water entering the water table mobilizes salt which then rises to the land surface. The movement of water drives salinization processes and may move the stored salt towards the soil surface or into surface water bodies.

IELTS General Reading Test

Questions 1–11

Complete the table below.

Choose NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS from the reading passage for each answer.

Read the text below and answer Questions 12-15.

Changes in Industrial Britain

The spread of railways stimulated communication, and Rowland Hill’s standardisation of postal charges in 1839 saw a boom in mail services. But this was nothing compared to the revolution of the telegraph. If you think the Internet is big then just imagine how much bigger it would seem if you had never before seen a computer or telephone.

That’s what the telegraph was to the Victorians. If rail travel shrank the country, the telegraph crushed it. It opened in the 1840s and soon went stratospheric – within ten years exchanging telegrams had become part of everyday life. By the mid-1860s London was connected with New York, and ten years later messages could be exchanged between London and Bombay in minutes.

IELTS General Reading Test

Questions 12 – 15

Choose NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER from the passage for each answer.

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ANSWERS

1. MARINE PLAINS/SALT LAKES

2. RAIN (H6) 

3. WIND

4. EVAPORATION

5. TRANSPIRATION

6. ROOT ZONE

7. LAND USE

8. IRRIGATION

9. DRYLAND

10. WATER TABLES

11. LAND SURFACE/SOIL SURFACE/SURFACE WATER BODIES

12. POSTAL CHARGES

13.  TELEGRAPH

14. 1860S / MID-1860S

15. MINUTES