AI Solved: Question textSection FRead the text on foreign aid and answer the following questions. 1. Foreign aid is a policy feature of many developed nations. When one country provides assistance to another, usually in the form of money, food, supplies, technology, or services, this is called foreign aid. This help is usually given to support poorer countries or those recovering from disasters, wars, or other crises. When foreign aid is delivered directly from one government to another it is called bilateral aid; if it goes through international organisations like the United Nations it is known as multilateral aid. The aim is to improve living conditions, support development, and create long-term benefits for both countries. 2. There are many aims of foreign aid. For the recipient country, the goal of foreign aid can be to reduce poverty, improve education and healthcare, or provide assistance with infrastructure necessities such as roads and clean water. Aid can also be given in response to emergencies such as floods, famines, or earthquakes. For the donor country, aid is often used to develop relationships, promote peace and security, and support countries with shared political or strategic interests. Sometimes, donor countries also give aid to generate trade opportunities or encourage political stability in certain regions. 3. It is not surprising that the biggest foreign aid providers are usually wealthier nations. Some of the top donors include the United States, Germany, the United Kingdom, Japan, France, and Canada. These countries often give aid through international programs or their own government agencies. For example, the United States gives aid through an organisation called USAID (United States Agency for International Development), while the UK has the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (FCDO). 4. Worldwide, foreign aid can come in many forms. It might be money sent to build schools or hospitals, or it could be food shipments during a famine. Aid can also include medicine and vaccines, especially during health crises like the COVID-19 pandemic. Sometimes donor countries send experts like doctors, teachers, or engineers to help train local workers. Other times, aid takes the form of infrastructure projects, like building bridges, roads, or water systems to help communities develop and grow. 5. Similarly, there is no typical dollar value for foreign aid. The amount of aid a country gives is usually measured as a percentage of its Gross Domestic Product (GDP), which is the total value of all goods and services it produces. Most donor countries give between 0.2% and 0.7% of their GDP to foreign aid each year. The United Nations has suggested that developed countries should aim to give 0.7%. Some countries, like Norway and Sweden, often meet or even exceed this goal, while others, like the United States, give a smaller percentage of their GDP, though they still give large amounts overall due to the size of their economies. 6. Foreign aid is a tool of “soft power”. Soft power is the ability of a country to influence others through attraction and persuasion rather than force or threats. Foreign aid is a powerful strategy to achieve this. When a country helps others in need, it can improve its reputation and make friends around the world. For example, China has invested heavily in Africa by building roads, hospitals, and schools, which boosts its image and influence. Similarly, Australia provides aid to nearby Pacific Island countries, helping to strengthen regional relationships and keep peace and stability in its neighbourhood. 7. Foreign aid often shows strong friendships between countries. For example, the United States gives large amounts of aid to Israel, reflecting their close political and military alliance. Australia provides aid to Papua New Guinea and other Pacific nations, which share cultural and geographical ties. The European Union provides aid to Ukraine to support its development and show solidarity during times of conflict. These examples show how foreign aid is not just about charity – it’s also about supporting allies and common goals. 8. In the future of foreign aid is likely to become more focused and smarter. Countries are now trying to make aid more effective by targeting the most urgent needs and making sure the money is well spent. Climate change, global health, and technology will likely become big priorities in future aid programs. As the world becomes more connected, helping others through aid will continue to be important for creating a safer, fairer, and more stable world for everyone.Questions 15 – 18. What is the author’s main point in each of these paragraphs?Choose from the list (a - g) below. There are 3 extra options. a. Aid money can be spent in a large number of ways. b. Giving aid can make countries softer. c. Foreign aid has benefits for both sides. d. Foreign aid is used to address natural or economic disasters. e. Less than 1% of aid is given by the United Nations. f. Military action is not the only way to increase strength. g. The largest donors are not necessarily the most generous 15. Paragraph 2 Answer 1 Question 9[select: , a.Aid money can be spent in a large number of ways., b. Giving aid can make countries softer., c. Foreign aid has benefits for both sides., d. Foreign aid is used to address natural or economic disasters., e. Less than 1% of aid is given by the United Nations., f. Military action is not the only way to increase strength., g. The largest donors are not necessarily the most generous.] 16. Paragraph 4Answer 2 Question 9[select: , a. Aid money can be spent in a large number of ways., b. Giving aid can make countries softer., c. Foreign aid has benefits for both sides., d. Foreign aid is used to address natural or economic disasters., e. Less than 1% of aid is given by the United Nations., f. Military action is not the only way to increase strength., g. The largest donors are not necessarily the most generous.] 17. Paragraph 5 Answer 3 Question 9[select: , a. Aid money can be spent in a large number of ways., b. Giving aid can make countries softer., c. Foreign aid has benefits for both sides., d. Foreign aid is used to address natural or economic disasters., e. Less than 1% of aid is given by the United Nations., f. Military action is not the only way to increase strength., g. The largest donors are not necessarily the most generous.] 18. Paragraph 6 Answer 4 Question 9[select: , a. Aid money can be spent in a large number of ways., b. Giving aid can make countries softer., c. Foreign aid has benefits for both sides., d. Foreign aid is used to address natural or economic disasters., e. Less than 1% of aid is given by the United Nations., f. Military action is not the only way to increase strength., g. The largest donors are not necessarily the most generous.] | Reading Comprehension | English | Black Tom

28. The speaker concludes that all schools should be Answer Question 22[input] of their students’ success.

Write ONE WORD from the text to complete the sentence. 24. ‘their’ in paragraph 4 refers to Answer Question 12[input].

Section FRead the text on urban housing and answer the following questions. 1. Melbourne - and indeed, all of Australia - will experience massive growth over the next decades – but where will these people live? And perhaps more importantly, how will they live? A TEDx talk by Jeremy McLeod, founder and director of Breathe Architecture, explores these questions. The answer is certainly not more suburban sprawl, but it’s also not necessarily high-density high rise. Unlike New South Wales, Victoria doesn’t have strict controls on minimum design quality in apartments – and in Melbourne the overheated property market has led to the construction of some truly terrible high-rise housing.2. So what might be an alternative to some of the poor quality, environmentally destructive, socially alienating and prohibitively expensive housing on the market today? McLeod describes how, back in 2007, he and a group of five architect colleagues got together to address exactly this question. They proposed The Commons: a medium-density housing development which would set out to meet a “triple bottom line” purpose: achieving social, environmental and financial sustainability. While that development was a success in design terms, it failed to be financially sustainable.3. It was at this point that McLeod and his collaborators made their revolutionary move, and came up with what they call the Nightingale Model (a financial paradigm). This shift is the real genius here: moving beyond an architectural model to a financial one, redesigning the funding process before designing any building. The Nightingale Model works on the principle of paring back construction costs (the lack of car parking has been controversial, but if you don’t have a car, and you do have a train, a tram, and a bike path outside your door, then it seems like a no-brainer). 4. It then goes further – by connecting directly with potential owner-occupiers it cuts out the marketing budget, relinquishing the need for an expensive display suite, or real estate agents. These savings are passed on to buyers. But any big construction project still needs financiers, and Nightingale 1.0 has twenty five of them, in addition to the future homeowners themselves, and the architects in the collective. But these are small investors, and their profits are capped at 15%. The cap removes any incentive to increase profit by squeezing quality, and there’s also a limit on how much apartments will be able to be sold for – for twenty years they can only be sold for the average price rise in the suburb on top of their purchase price. The point is that this is not an investment property which can be flipped to turn a swift buck.5. The Nightingale model is scalable and replicable: it is not specific to a particular site or design, and can be rolled out across every city in Australia (or even the world!). Sure enough, there are already three projects at various stages of development – Nightingale 1.0, in Brunswick, has achieved council approval and begun site works, while another project in Fairfield is well advanced, and a third is in planning stages.6. There has been so much interest from potential buyers in Nightingale 1.0 (reportedly 800 people on a waitlist for 44 apartments) that they had to be selected by ballot. Other property developers in Melbourne are reportedly flabbergasted at the project’s popularity in spite of its having broken all the rules about what people (supposedly) want in apartments.7. So, what do we make of all this? The Nightingale model is in fact quite close to a housing collective – a model with a long (and still active) history in Australian cities. But Nightingale goes beyond the post-hippie gaggle of friends that makes up many housing collectives, to a scale that is much larger, and much more ambitious. It’s no coincidence many collectives are packed with architects – who invariably believe that there are other values more important than money, and that architecture is more than a branch of real estate.8. That said, it’s not common for architects to initiate a project from scratch. As the critic Reyner Banham once wrote, architects spend their professional lives standing ready to be “propositioned” by a client: “[They] depend upon someone coming forward with the proposition in one hand and the money bag in the other.” The Nightingale team have set out to avoid this compromise by sticking to low-cost principles and finding ways to fund their projects, keeping the owner-occupier and the architect at the centre of the process. Questions 23 – 24 . What do the underlined words in the text refer to? Write ONE WORD from the text to compete the sentences. 23. ‘them’ in paragraph 4 refers to Answer Question 11[input].

Question textSection FRead the text on urban housing and answer the following questions. 1. Melbourne - and indeed, all of Australia - will experience massive growth over the next decades – but where will these people live? And perhaps more importantly, how will they live? A TEDx talk by Jeremy McLeod, founder and director of Breathe Architecture, explores these questions. The answer is certainly not more suburban sprawl, but it’s also not necessarily high-density high rise. Unlike New South Wales, Victoria doesn’t have strict controls on minimum design quality in apartments – and in Melbourne the overheated property market has led to the construction of some truly terrible high-rise housing.2. So what might be an alternative to some of the poor quality, environmentally destructive, socially alienating and prohibitively expensive housing on the market today? McLeod describes how, back in 2007, he and a group of five architect colleagues got together to address exactly this question. They proposed The Commons: a medium-density housing development which would set out to meet a “triple bottom line” purpose: achieving social, environmental and financial sustainability. While that development was a success in design terms, it failed to be financially sustainable.3. It was at this point that McLeod and his collaborators made their revolutionary move, and came up with what they call the Nightingale Model (a financial paradigm). This shift is the real genius here: moving beyond an architectural model to a financial one, redesigning the funding process before designing any building. The Nightingale Model works on the principle of paring back construction costs (the lack of car parking has been controversial, but if you don’t have a car, and you do have a train, a tram, and a bike path outside your door, then it seems like a no-brainer).4. It then goes further – by connecting directly with potential owner-occupiers it cuts out the marketing budget, relinquishing the need for an expensive display suite, or real estate agents. These savings are passed on to buyers. But any big construction project still needs financiers, and Nightingale 1.0 has twenty five of them, in addition to the future homeowners themselves, and the architects in the collective. But these are small investors, and their profits are capped at 15%. The cap removes any incentive to increase profit by squeezing quality, and there’s also a limit on how much apartments will be able to be sold for – for twenty years they can only be sold for the average price rise in the suburb on top of their purchase price. The point is that this is not an investment property which can be flipped to turn a swift buck.5. The Nightingale model is scalable and replicable: it is not specific to a particular site or design, and can be rolled out across every city in Australia (or even the world!). Sure enough, there are already three projects at various stages of development – Nightingale 1.0, in Brunswick, has achieved council approval and begun site works, while another project in Fairfield is well advanced, and a third is in planning stages.6. There has been so much interest from potential buyers in Nightingale 1.0 (reportedly 800 people on a waitlist for 44 apartments) that they had to be selected by ballot. Other property developers in Melbourne are reportedly flabbergasted at the project’s popularity in spite of its having broken all the rules about what people (supposedly) want in apartments.7. So, what do we make of all this? The Nightingale model is in fact quite close to a housing collective – a model with a long (and still active) history in Australian cities. But Nightingale goes beyond the post-hippie gaggle of friends that makes up many housing collectives, to a scale that is much larger, and much more ambitious. It’s no coincidence many collectives are packed with architects – who invariably believe that there are other values more important than money, and that architecture is more than a branch of real estate.8. That said, it’s not common for architects to initiate a project from scratch. As the critic Reyner Banham once wrote, architects spend their professional lives standing ready to be “propositioned” by a client: “[They] depend upon someone coming forward with the proposition in one hand and the money bag in the other.” The Nightingale team have set out to avoid this compromise by sticking to low-cost principles and finding ways to fund their projects, keeping the owner-occupier and the architect at the centre of the process. Questions 19 – 22. Which paragraphs contain the following supporting information? Match the information to the paragraph number. 19. Locating developments close to public transport can help reduce costs Answer 1 Question 10[select: , Paragraph 1, Paragraph 2, Paragraph 3, Paragraph 4, Paragraph 5, Paragraph 6, Paragraph 7, Paragraph 8, Paragraph 9] 20. Quality control in residential building in Australia varies from state to state. Answer 2 Question 10[select: , Paragraph 1, Paragraph 2, Paragraph 3, Paragraph 4, Paragraph 5, Paragraph 6, Paragraph 7, Paragraph 8, Paragraph 9] 21. The fact that the project is already being replicated is an indication of its success. Answer 3 Question 10[select: , Paragraph 1, Paragraph 2, Paragraph 3, Paragraph 4, Paragraph 5, Paragraph 6, Paragraph 7, Paragraph 8, Paragraph 9] 22. An initial project which aimed to be sustainable in multiple ways. Answer 4 Question 10[select: , Paragraph 1, Paragraph 2, Paragraph 3, Paragraph 4, Paragraph 5, Paragraph 6, Paragraph 7, Paragraph 8, Paragraph 9]

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