Why 'word stress' is important! A short video on pronunciation.

Business News

Fill in the gaps below with the following words:

contraction, first half, slumped, forecast, opened, taking on, flat, pump, sliding, dropped,

Oil prices recovered slightly today, after ......... a day earlier on concerns about energy demand
Oil exploration company Tullow says its total revenue for the.................of 2009 is expected to be about £290m
Oil prices ............... by well over a dollar a barrel to below $62 a barrel this evening
There was a record economic ............. in the euro zone in the first quarter, the EU statistics office has confirmed.
The International Monetary Fund today raised its 2010 global economic growth .............to 2.5%.
Google is planning a direct attack on Microsoft by...............the dominant Windows operating system
Wall Street markets ............. lower this afternoon but European markets were higher
The Bank of England is likely to ............ more money into markets and keep its key interest rate at 0.5% tomorrow.
Oil prices ............... to their lowest levels since late May this evening.

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LISTENING FOR IELTS/ADVANCED STUDENTS

FILL IN THE GAPS WITH WORDS FROM THE LIST BELOW:

contraction decline target decline wages pace measure contraction spending cuts gradually forecast weak predicts projection predicted

The Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development has made a relatively pessimistic --------- for the Irish economy in its June economic outlook.
According to the OECD it expects Ireland's economic output (gross domestic product or GDP) to -------- by 9.8 per cent this year compared to a -------- of 7.7 per cent -------- by the Minister for Finance Brian Lenihan in the April supplementary budget.

In April the Government set a borrowing -------- of 10.75 per cent but the OECD reckons this will widen to 11.5 per cent this year and to 13.6 per cent next year.

Irish unemployment is expected to rise to 12.2 per cent this year, according to the OECD and to almost 15 per cent in 2010. Inflation, as measured by the harmonised index of consumer prices, is expected to fall to -1.3 per cent this year. This --------- excludes the impact of mortgage interest repayments.

"The [Irish] economy is experiencing a severe -------- as large domestic imbalances correct, compounded by the global downturn and financial crisis. With the recession already well entrenched and further --------- expected, the peak-to-trough fall in GDP is set to reach 14 per cent", it said.

The OECD said Irish economic activity will recover in 2010 but at a slow ------.

"With severe pressure on the public finances, it is appropriate that fiscal consolidation has begun. Substantial --------------- and increases in taxation are required in the coming years.”

“Problems in the banking sector must be resolved at a reasonable cost. Competitiveness would be restored by lower---------and stronger competition," according to the OECD's summary for Ireland.

For the wider group of 30 member countries the OECD said the slowdown was close to the bottom.

This is the first time in two years that its outlook has improved, although it notes soaring unemployment and ballooning budget deficits could knock a -------- recovery off track.

It ----------growth of 0.7 per cent for the member states next year after a 4.1 per cent fall this year, a more optimistic forecast than for Ireland.
"This is the first time since 2007 that we have revised up the projection," OECD chief economist Jorgen Elmeskov said.
"The bad news is that the -----------still implies that we are only nearing the bottom now and the recovery that follows is going to be a very slow one, probably a fragile one."
World trade will ---------- stabilise and then slowly pick up from around the end of this year, the OECD said.

LISTENING FOR UPPER INTERMEDIATE/ADVANCED LEARNERS OF ENGLISH

Fill in the missing gaps with words from the list below:

misleading, warned, fares, fares, health, blacklist, standards, clamping down, cleaning up, details, fallen, pricing, state, passed on.

ALL three of Ireland's airlines have .........foul of requirements to make their prices fully transparent for consumers.
Aer Lingus, Ryanair and Aer Arann were yesterday ..............they need to finish .............their websites to make sure customers get a true picture of the full cost of their .......... .
The European Commission yesterday published a report on the .................of airline ticket-selling websites across Europe.
The three Irish airlines were all placed on a "grey list" of companies which still have work to do to meet all the ..................required of them under consumer protection rules.
The EU has been ................ on websites that are not fully upfront about their charges, or which make ................claims about sale prices or attempt to trap consumers into purchasing hidden extras.
It said the airlines appearing on the grey list had given commitments to the EU that they would make their websites more transparent, and would be .............. to national regulators for further action if necessary.
The EU also published a ....................of airlines which had failed to cooperate at all with the new laws on ...................transparency -- these were Olympic, Turkish Airlines, Royal Moroccan Airlines, Northwest, Air Baltic, Aeroflot, Wing Jet and Emirates.
Some 16 airlines were given a clean bill of ................, meaning they had met all requirements to make prices fully transparent to consumers. These included bmi, bmibaby, Iberia, Spanair and Virgin Atlantic.

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