我们的社会可以既富有又环保吗？
[A]"If our economies are to flourish, if global poverty is to be eliminated and if well-being of the world's people enhanced-not just in this generation but in succeeding generations-we must make sure we take care of the natural environment and resources on which our economic activity depends."
如果我们要使经济蓬勃发展要消除全球贫困，要提升人民的幸福，不仅仅在我们这一代，还包括我们的子孙后代，我们就必须确保自己能保护好经济活动所依赖的自然还和资源。
That statement comes not, as you might imagine, from a stereotypical tree-hugging, save-the-world greenie(环保主义者), but from Gordon Brown, a politician with a reputation for rigour, thoroughness and above all, caution.
这番言论并非如你所想，出自一位典型的爱护树木，且想拯救世界的环保主义者，而是出自以严格，一丝不苟和谨慎著称的政治家嘎登布朗。
[B]A surprising thing for the man who runs one of the world's most powerful economies to say?
对于这位管理着世界最强经济体之一的人士而言，此番言论会不会令人诧异？
Perhaps; though in the run-up to the five-year review of the Millennium(千年的)Goals, he is far from alone.
或许会吧，尽管处于千年目标的，5年回顾临近之际，有同样想法的人却绝非嘎登布朗一个。
The roots of his speech, given in March at the roundtable meeting of environment and energy ministers from the G20 group of nations, stretch back to 1972, and the United Nations Conference on the Human Environment in Stockholm.
他于3月，在20国集团的环境和能源部长圆桌会议上发表的演讲，可追溯到1972年在斯德哥尔摩召开的联合国人类环境会议。
[C]"The protection and improvement of the human environment is a major issue which affects the well-being of peoples and economic development throughout the world," read the final declaration from this gathering, the first of a sequence which would lead to the Rio de Janerio Earth Summit in 1992 and the World Development Summit in Johannesburg three years ago.
此次会议的最终宣言中提到“保护和改善人类环境是一个影响人类幸福和世界经济发展的重要议题”，这次会议结束后又陆续召开了1992年的里约热内卢地球峰会，以及三年前的约翰内斯堡世界发展峰会。
[D]Hunt through the reports prepared by UN agencies and development groups-many for conferences such as this year's Millennium Goals review-and you will find that the linkage between environmental protection and economic progress is a common thread.
3月由联合国机构和发展组织发布的报告，多数是为向今年的千年目标回顾等会议准备的，你会发现环境保护和经济发展之间的联系是他们共同的主题。
[E]Managing ecosystems sustainably is more profitable than exploiting them, according to the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment.
根据【千年生态系统评估报告】，对生态系统进行可持续性管理比开发他们更有利可图。
But finding hard evidence to support the thesis is not so easy.
但是要想找到确凿的证据来支持这一论点并非易事。
Thoughts turn first to some sort of global statistic, some indicator which would rate the wealth of nations in both economic and environmental terms and show a relationship between the two.
人们首先要想到某种全球性的统计数据，即某种能够在经济和环境方面对国家的财富进行评估并表明二者关系的指标。
[F]If such an indicator exists, it is well hidden.
如果这种指标是存在的，那么他隐藏的很好。
And on reflection, this is not surprising; the single word "environment" has so many dimensions, and there are so many other factors affecting wealth-such as the oil deposits-that teasing out a simple economy-environment relationship would be almost impossible.
仔细想想这并不奇怪，环境一词的涵盖面如此之广，加之影响财富的其他因素如此之多，比如石油存储。以至于梳理出一种简单的经济与环境关系，几乎是不可能的。
[G]The Millennium Ecosystem Assessment, a vast four-year global study which reported its initial conclusions earlier this year, found reasons to believe that managing ecosystem sustainably-working with nature rather than against it-might be less profitable in the short term, but certainly brings long-term rewards.
千年生态系统评估报告是一项历时4年的全球性大规模研究，在今年早些时候公布了其初步结论，它使我们有理由相信对生态系统进行可持续性管理与自然共处而非与之对抗，在短期内也获利较少，但一定会带来长期回报。
[H]And the World Resources Institute (WRI) in its World Resources 2005 report, issued at the end of August, produced several such examples from Africa and Asia; it also demonstrated that environmental degradation affects the poor more than the rich, as poorer people derive a much higher proportion of their income directly from the natural resources around them.
世界资源研究所在其8月底发布的2005年世界资源报告中列举了几个关于非洲和亚洲的相关实例，报告还表明，环境恶化对穷人造成的影响比对富人的更大，因为越贫穷的人从周围自然资源中直接获取的收入占其总收入的比例越高。
[I]But there are also many examples of growing wealth by trashing the environment, in rich and poor parts of the world alike, whether through unregulated mineral extraction, drastic water use for agriculture, slash-and-burn farming, or fossil-fuel-guzzling(大量消耗)transport.
然而无论是不规范的矿产开采，过量的农业用水，刀耕火种的耕作方式，还是大量的消耗化石燃料的运输，这些通过破坏环境积累财富的例子，在世界的富裕地区和贫困地区均不在少数。
Of course, such growth may not persist in the long term-which is what Mr. Brown and the Stockholm declaration were both attempting to point out.
当然从长期来看，如此积累财富并非长久之计。而这正是布朗先生和斯德哥尔摩宣言都试图指出的问题。
Perhaps the best example of boom growth and bust decline is the Grand Bank fishery.
或许大浅滩渔业是繁荣增长和萧条衰退的最佳例证。
For almost five centuries a very large supply of cod(鳕鱼)provided abundant raw material for an industry which at its peak employed about 40000 people, sustaining entire communities in Newfoundland.
近5个世纪以来，鳕鱼的大量供应为该行业提供的丰富的原料，使其在繁荣的顶峰时期，曾雇佣大约4万人，维持了纽芬兰整个社会的生机。
Then, abruptly, the cod population collapsed.
然后鳕鱼的数量忽然锐减。
There were no longer enough fish in the sea for the stock to maintain itself, let alone an industry.
海里剩下的鳕鱼数量已经不足以供其自身繁衍生息，维持整个行业的发展更是不可能。
More than a decade later, there was no sign of the ecosystem rebuilding itself. It had, apparently, been fished out of existence; and the once mighty Newfoundland fleet now gropes about frantically for crab on the sea floor.
10多年后，该生态系统依然没有自我重建的迹象，显然已经因为捕捞而不复存在了，曾经威猛的纽芬兰船队现在只能在海底疯狂的搜寻螃蟹。
[J]There is a view that modern humans are inevitably sowing the seeds of a global Grand Banks-style disaster.
有一种观点认为现代人正不可避免的，散播着全球性大浅滩是灾难的种子。
The idea is that we are taking more out of what you might call the planet's environmental bank balance than it can sustain; we are living beyond our ecological means.
其中心思想是，我们正在从你们可能称之为地球环境银行的余额中大量索取，并已超出其可承受的范围，我们正在透支我们的生态环境。
One recent study attempted to calculate the extent of this "ecological goods and services-the implication being that at some point the debt will be called in, and all those services-the things which the planet does for us for free-will grind to a halt.
最近的一项研究试图计算出这种人类经济的生态超载程度，该研究发现我们正在使用的环境资源与服务，是地球能够承受的1.2倍，这表明在某一时刻，我们将要偿还这些债务，而且所有的服务，地球无偿为我们提供的资源，都将停止。
[K]Whether this is right, and if so where and when the ecological axe will fell, is hard to determine with any precision-which is why governments and financial institutions are only beginning to bring such risks into their economic calculations.
这种观点是对的吗？如果是生态的大幅，会在何时何地会咯，这都难以确切断定，这就是为什么政府和金融机构才刚开始将这些风险纳入他们的经济计算中。
It is also the reason why development agencies are not united in their view of environmental issues; while some, like the WRI, maintain the environmental progress needs to go hand-in-hand with economic development, others argue that the priorty is to build a thriving economy, and then use the wealth created to tackle environmental degradation.
这也是发展机构在环境问题上的看法，不一致的原因，尽管一些机构，比如世界资源研究所认为环境改善和经济发展是需要携手并进的，而其他机构则认为发展繁荣经济才是首要任务，然后再用所创造的财富解决环境恶化问题。
[L]This view assumes that rich societies will invest in environmental care.
这种观点认为赋予的社会将投资环境保护。
But is this right? Do things get better or worse as we get richer? Here the Stockholm declaration is ambiguous. "In the developing countries," it says, "most of the environmental problems are caused by underdevelopment."
但这是对的吗？当我们变得更为富有时，情况会变得更好，还是更糟呢，对此斯德哥尔摩宣言的解释是模棱两可的。宣言中说道，发展中国家的大部分环境问题是由欠发达所引发的。
So it is saying that economic development should make for a cleaner world? Not necessary; "In the industrialized countries, environmental problems are generally related to industrialization and technological development," it continues.
所以这就能说明经济发展有助于缔造一个更洁净的世界吗？也不尽然，宣言中还说道，工业化国家的环境问题通常与工业化和技术发展有关。
In other words, poor and rich both over-exploit the natural world, but for different reasons. It's simply not true that economic growth will surely make our world cleaner.
换言之，无论贫穷与富裕，人类社会都会在过度开发自然界，只是原因不尽相同，经济增长必定会使我们的世界更为洁净的这一观点并不属实。
[M]Clearly, richer societies are able to provide environmental improvements which lie well beyond the reach of poorer communities.
显然赋予的社会有能力改善环境，这是贫穷社会所望尘莫及的。
Citizens of wealthy nations demand national parks, clean rivers, clean air and poison-free food.
富裕国家的公民要求建立国家公园，并享有干净的河流，洁净的空气以及无毒的食品。
They also, however, use for more natural resources-fuel, water (all those baths and golf courses) and building materials.
然而他们也在大量使用自然资源，如燃料水所有的浴场和高尔夫球场，以及建筑材料。
[N]A case can be made that rich nations export environmental problems, the most graphic example being climate change.
事实证明，富裕的国家会引发环境问题，气候变化就是最生动的例子。
As a country's wealth grows, so do its greenhouse gas emissions.
随着一个国家的财富增长，其温室气体排放量也会增高。
The figures available will not be completely accurate.
可用数据并不是完全准确的。
Measuring emissions is not a precise science, particularly when it comes to issues surrounding land use; not all nations have released up-to-date data, and in any case, emissions from some sectors such as aviation are not included in national statistics.
测量排放量不是一门精准的科学，尤其是涉及土地利用问题，并非所有的国家都发布了最新数据，而且不论何种情况一些行业，比如航空业的排放量是不纳入国家统计数据之内的。
But the data is exact enough for a clear trend to be easily discernible.
但是现有数据，已精确到足够使我们轻易辨别出一个明确的趋势。
As countries become richer, they produce more greenhouse gases; and the impact of those gases will fall primary in poor parts of the world.
随着国家变得越加富有，他们会产生更多的温室气体，而这些温室气体将主要影响世界上的贫困地区。
[O]Wealth is not, of course, the only factor involved.
当然财富并不是唯一的影响因素。
The average Norwegian is better off than the average US citizen, but contributes about half as much to climate change.
一般的挪威人比美国普通老百姓更富有。但他们对气候变化的影响仅为美国大众公民的一半。
But could Norway keep its standard of living and yet cut its emissions to Moroccan or even Ethiopian levels?
可是挪威能够在保持其生活水平不变的同时，将温室气体排放量削减至摩洛哥甚至是埃塞俄比亚的水平吗？
That question, repeated across a dozen environmental issues and across our diverse planet, is what will ultimately determine whether the human race is living beyond its ecological means as it pursues economic revival.
这个疑问在诸多环境问题的讨论中，以及我们多样性的地球上不断被提起，也将最终决定人类在追求经济复苏的同时，是否已透支其生态环境。
2016年6月6级真题
