Facts and figures

Facts and figures

Listen to the lecturer giving some facts and figures to practise and improve your listening skills.

Do the preparation task first. Then listen to the audio and do the exercises.

Preparation

Transcript

… and the next part of this talk is on the Panama Canal. It's amazing how this one small section of a small country can be so important to the world. Let's learn a little bit about the canal itself, before we look at how it connects to everything else.

The Panama Canal is an artificial waterway in the Central American country of Panama that connects the Atlantic and Pacific Ocean. It is only 82 kilometres long. If you go around South America by ship then you need to travel another 15,000 kilometres. So the canal saves a lot of travel time. It takes around 8 to 10 hours to cross the canal.

The French started building the canal in 1881, but they couldn't finish it. The project was started again in 1904 by the United States and the canal was finally finished in 1914. Many people died while they were building the canal, some say up to 25,000. For the rest of the 20th century, the United States controlled the canal, but gave control back to Panama in 2000.

Every year, around 40,000 ships come through the canal. These are mostly commercial ships. They transport goods for trade between Asia and America, or Europe. In 2016 the government of Panama made the canal bigger, so that now 99 per cent of ships can pass through it.

Let's now turn to the role of the Panama Canal in the global economy …

Task 1

Task 2

Discussion

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Average: 4.1 (45 votes)
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Submitted by Rinaa on Thu, 13/08/2020 - 21:49

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As an economist, I must have to be good with numbers because I have to deal with them every day. Preparing financial statements, collecting data, analyzing data, and using accounting software is my daily routine. When it comes to numbers, we should be so careful and focused, because if you slip a number or add one more, we can change all the results. But today the computer and software are helping us too much, by correcting our mistakes and giving us a chance to check them twice. But unfortunately, I'm not good at remembering the phone numbers, except for my self and my parents I hardly remember other people's phone numbers, and this is bad because in case of an emergency we should keep in mind some contact numbers of our relatives. And as many of the members here, I have a problem with numbers in English, in this audio, I couldn't define forty with fourteen without seeing the script.

Submitted by Phan Bao Dung on Thu, 30/07/2020 - 17:49

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I am better at arithmetic than geometry so I'm interested in numbers to prefer. I can do mental arithmetic quickly with 3 digit numbers. Also, I can remember the phone numbers, license plates, or any numbers that I look at once. Everybody seems to be surprised by my ability.

Submitted by Jerome NR on Mon, 27/07/2020 - 14:50

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Panama canal is great

Submitted by fatfat on Thu, 23/07/2020 - 13:09

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I am good with numbers but while I am listening the numbers in English I don't understand because it pass fast.I need to listen the numbers many times.

Submitted by Ehsan1984 on Tue, 21/07/2020 - 16:14

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actually i like numbers so i believe i am good at them.

Hello AzaelRZ,

There is a technical problem with our audio. I'm sorry for the inconvenience and thank you for telling us. We are working on a solution and hopefully the audio will be working soon.

Best wishes,

Kirk

The LearnEnglish Tea

Submitted by Dastenova Firuza on Sat, 11/07/2020 - 18:53

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Numbers are my weak pint, unfortunately.

Submitted by SHERIFHAMOUDA on Fri, 10/07/2020 - 20:59

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i think that because i spent around 20 years with the numbers because i'm accountant