Ministerul Educaţiei, Cercetării şi Inovării

Centrul Naţional pentru Curriculum şi Evaluare în Învăţământul Preuniversitar

Examenul de bacalaureat 2009

Proba E/F
Proba scrisă la Limba engleză
L1 - Bilingv

• Toate subiectele sunt obligatorii. Se acordă 10 puncte din oficiu.

• Timpul efectiv de lucru este de 3 ore.

SUBIECTUL I (30 de puncte) Varianta 011

Read the text below and complete the following tasks.

Domestic waste is one thing; industrial waste is another. Industrial waste may contain such
nasty things as compounds of heavy metals and dioxins and PCBs. (1) … So what do you do?
According to one man in the business: "It's simple - you go to Senegal, Djibouti or somewhere like
Mauritania, all poor and semi-desert countries. You contact the local authorities and they take you
somewhere really crazy, out in the middle of nowhere, just scorpions and snakes. You pay well,
and then you start to dig your pit, some 30 metres down, all water-proof and according to US,
Swiss and EC regulations. Finally, you can start your shipments."
In Europe it costs about $500 a ton to dispose of hazardous waste; in Africa, it can cost as
little as $2.50 a ton. Like the drugs rackets or the armaments business, the trade in toxic waste
frequently involves a man, a telephone and a small office, registered in a country where owners do
not have to be named. Payments made to African companies and individuals are sometimes
bigger than the entire GNP of those countries. But those payments are not revealed. The business
goes on in a sort of twilight zone between the legal and the illegal.
(2) … A typical case is that of Benin. One must suppose, possibly, that the failure of Benin
to take a "proper" commercial attitude to the toxic waste business lies in the country's Marxist-
Leninist political system or then, perhaps not. Also from Benin comes the story of the shipment of
two shiploads of radioactive waste from France. (3) …
One of the more publicised scandals occurred in Nigeria. It was a deal arranged between
government departments and an import-export company. The company was registered to "import
residues of several industrial processes". Taking advantage of this broad and imprecise definition,
several Italian companies started importing the waste quite legally. As a result, several Italians
were arrested in Lagos. The waste was disposed of at Koko, a small port, well away from Lagos
and inspection. However, the waste stank. Drums of it became so hot that dockers could not
handle them. The smell of the waste affected the whole area. (4) …

1. Four sentences have been removed from the text. Select the appropriate sentence for
each gap in the text. There is one extra sentence which you do not need to use. 4 points

A. However, a properly organized waste disposal trade could easily wipe out the country's national
debt.
B. Reports that it has been buried in an area known for its opposition to the government have been
denied by Benin's president, Matthieu Kerekou.
C. And in this case you really need to get the support of the consultant.
D. Nobody, but nobody, wants that cancerous stuff in their own backyard. And in this case, you
really do not have to go to Africa to find it.
E. It turned out that the drums contained PCB (polychlorobiphenyl).

2. Explain the underlined words. 6 points

1. hazardous
2. twilight zone
3. shiploads
 Ministerul Educaţiei, Cercetării şi Inovării
Centrul Naţional pentru Curriculum şi Evaluare în Învăţământul Preuniversitar

3. Sum up the text in about 50 words. 10 points

4. For the following questions, choose the answer (A, B, C or D) which fits according to the
text. 6 points

1. The business of disposing of toxic waste requires:

A. a large organisation
B. contacts in third world countries
C. licensing
D. a remote site

2. The organisers of the business prefer:

A. limited investment
B. to work on their own
C. to deal with individuals rather than companies
D. anonymity

3. For some countries, the amount of money involved would:

A. create a positive balance of trade
B. provide development capital
C. allow them to limit opposition to the government
D. encourage communism

5. Comment on the following in about 100 words: Domestic waste is one thing; industrial waste
is another. 4 points