英语听力精选进阶版 7349（在线收听）

日前一项报告说，由于大象走私贩正在企图恢复他们在泰国旅游营地周围的赚钱行当，缅甸的亚洲野生象被置于恶劣的环境中。国际濒临绝种野生动植物贸易调查委员会（TRAFFIC）在他们发表的这篇报告里称，走私犯利用残酷手段野蛮地对待幼象。

Elephants are used to entertain foreign and domestic tourists at trekking camps all over Thailand. As visitors prefer younger animals, the value of elephant calves has soared to around $33,000 for a healthy specimen.

To meet this demand, smugglers in Myanmar capture and tame wild elephants from the country's shrinking herds. The young elephants are caught in pit-traps, cruelly beaten to break their spirits and then smuggled across the border. The Thai authorities have cracked down on this trade with some success over the past two years, but campaigners believe that criminals are now stocking up, ready to transport the animals once again, when restrictions end.

Traffic and other campaigners want to see a toughening up of the laws in Thailand. Elephants don't have to be registered there until they are eight years old, creating an opportunity for smuggled calves to be 'laundered' into the domestic population.

Asian elephants already face threats from habitat loss, agriculture and ivory poachers. According to researchers, the extra strain put on by the smuggling of live young elephants could threaten the long-term survival of the species in Myanmar.

Quiz 听力测验

1. Which country’s tourist industry are the elephants mentioned in this report used for?

Thailand.

2. True or false? The size of elephants in Myanmar is shrinking.

False. The number of elephants in herds is shrinking or reducing.

3. What makes it possible for the smuggled calves to be 'laundered' into the Thai elephant population?

Elephants in Thailand do not have to be registered until they are eight years old.

4. What word is used in the report to mean ‘an animal group whose members all have similar general features and is able to produce young animals together’?

Species.

Glossary 词汇表

soared 骤然猛升

tame 驯服

to break their spirits 挫伤它们的精神意志（使其受训）

cracked down 严厉打击

toughening up 增强...力度

laundered （原意：洗黑钱；此处指）鱼目混珠，蒙混进入

habitat loss 栖息地丧失