▶ Your Answer : While the reading passage lists the three advantages of agricultural subsidies, the speaker argues that these advantages are correspondingly eclipsed by three disadvantages of it. To begin with, the reading passage says that agricultural subsidies can stabilize the food supply because a lot of farmers can grow additional crops by using money from subsidies. This can be true, but the speaker indicates that the way of giving special payments to farmers cannot increase the supply of food because almost every farmer is focusing on make the alternative products such as corn by using their money, and it means that subsidies cannot be helpful to stabilize the food supply. So, it's not convincing to say that agricultural subsidies can affect the supply of food positively. On top of that, the reading passage purports that giving money to farmers can be helpful to lower the price of food because the subsidies can help farmers to sell their products at a lower price with preserving their profit. However, this is not correct. The speaker indicates that farmers are just concentrating on growing certain kinds of food like corn, and if they get subsidies to use for farming, they would use enlarge the region of growing certain kinds of food, and it means the price of the kinds of food we though like fruits cannot be lower. So, the second assertion in this reading passage does not sound plausible. Lastly, the reading passage says that subsidies can be helpful for economic health of rural communities because many farmers would increase their amount of land cultivation, and they would naturally hire a lot of people, which means residents of the rural area can find more jobs in the past. However, the lecturer indicates that mechanical equipments are increasing to be used in the diverse kinds of farming society, and it means that subsidies cannot help the rural regions' economy because they would not hire more residents. So, it's a bit of exaggeration to say that giving the subsidies can help the rural area economically. |