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| Words in the News
Monday 24 June 2002
Vocabulary from the news. Listen to and read the report then find explanations of difficult words below.
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Zimbabwean farmers
Summary: The majority of white farmers in Zimbabwe will have to stop working their land from 24th June, according to new laws passed last month, which give the government powers to take the land and re-distribute it. Many fear that the already serious food shortages in Zimbabwe will now get worse. This report from Martin Plaut.
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| | The News | |
| | | Zimbabwe consumes around two hundred thousand tonnes of grain a month. But since the beginning of June almost all domestic stocks have been exhausted. Forty thousand tonnes are being imported commercially, and small quantities are coming through from aid donors, but that leaves a gapingfood deficit. Nearly two thirds of Zimbabwe's needs are not being supplied. For a country that was once the breadbasket of southern Africa this is nothing short of a disaster. Wheat for milling has been cut back to eke out supplies, leaving bakers producing only half the bread they normally provide. Everywhere there is hunger, and it's getting worse. Yet crops now in the fields cannot be legally harvested, in terms of the regulations that come into force today. By the end of the year six million people - half the population of Zimbabwe - will need food aid, according to the World Food Programme. Even government ministers admit that their policies have exacerbated the situation. Yet the government appears determined to press ahead with its confrontation with the white farming community, whatever the cost.
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| | The Words
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| | | grain
seeds from cereal crops, such as wheat, grown for food
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| | | domestic stocks
supplies of grain in Zimbabwe
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| | | exhausted
completely used up
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| | | gaping
enormous
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| | | food deficit
if a country has a food deficit, it is importing more than it is producing
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| | | milling
grinding to make flour
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| | | eke out supplies
make them last longer
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| | | harvested
gathered in, collected
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| | | exacerbated
made worse
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| | | press ahead with
to continue doing, in spite of possible problems
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