Fordlandia reading Answers

Fordlandia reading answers practice test is provided with answers and explanations. This passage comprises 13 questions divided into three question types that answer the questions and classify the following. 

Table of contents:

• Solution for Fordlandia
• Fordlandia IELTS Reading Practice Test
• Passage
• Questions
• Answers with Explanations

Solution for Fordlandia

Fordlandia reading answers are listed in the table below. Verify your answers against our answer table, then correct any inaccuracies.

Answer Table

1. True	5. Appropriate	9. Local Customs	13. Synthetic rubber reading answers
2. True	6. Significant Quantity	10. Riot (followed)
3. Not Given	7. Company Engineers	11. Leaf Blight
4. False	8. Monoculture	12. Trained horticulture

Fordlandia IELTS Reading Practice Test - Exam Review

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Fordlandia reading answers are given here, which will help you practise your reading module. This IELTS reading practice test is to make you ready for the actual IELTS examination. Finding the answers will be simple with the right vocabulary. Additionally, using the skimming and scanning approach will give you enough time to proofread the responses at the end.

Passage

We’ve provided the reading passage of Fordlandia. Read the passage and carefully complete the questions. Check the answers with our Fordlandia reading answers with locations.

Fordlandia

Natural latex, or rubber, comes from the sap of rubber trees. Native to the Amazon region of South America, they had long been a Brazilian monopoly, and the boom in wild rubber had made many remote jungle towns rich, until thousands of seeds of the tree were smuggled out by an entrepreneurial Brit, Henry Wickham. These were used to start plantations throughout British East-Asia, where the trees, facing none of their natural insect or fund=gal enemies, thrived. Thus, the Brazilian rubber boom crashed, leaving control of the world's supplies with the plantation owners in Malaysia (where to this day, most of the world’s natural rubber is still produced).

But in the late 1920s, the automobile tycoon, Henry Ford, had a vision. He believed in vertical integration— that is, a  supply chain of car parts and products unites through his ownership. With his factories producing hundreds of thousands of cars, each of them needing rubber tyres, Ford wanted his own source of rubber and resented dealing with the British plantation interests. He therefore, decided to buy a huge tract of Amazonian workers and lifestyle, in order to make the largest rubber plantation on the planet. It would be called Fordlandia — ambitious, grandiose, and doomed from the beginning.

The first mistake was to hire a rather untrustworthy Brazilian to scout for the best location in the Amazon, This man recommended a damp, rocky, and infertile series of hillsides near the Tapajos river, a tributary of the wide and mighty Amazon. In 1928, Ford blindly acquired a 10,000-square-kilometres concession and immediately ordered an immense amount of infrastructure to be built-at huge cost. To this end, earth-moving equipment arrived, tractors, stump-pullers, trains, prefabricated living quarters, and food-making equipment. The surface jungle was cleared, scores of Ford's employees were relocated, and out of this wilderness sprang an instant slice of America, complete with a modern hospital, library, hotels, ice cream makers, and  now upon row  of prefabricated houses positioned along nicely paved streets.

 The second big mistake was that, incredibly, Ford never thought to consult trained horticulturists. He naively assumed that his own company engineers. Who had proven their worth in the production of cars, would prove equally adept at this agricultural endeavour. Thus, they planted the rubber trees thickly together, believing that they would nourish in their home environment. However, in the Amazonian jungle, wild rubber trees are actually few and far between — a defence against the prodigious insect life which chews, drills, sucks, and bites. In such environments, monocultural farming approaches are dubious at best. Ford’s young rubber trees had no sooner appeared from the ground than they were attacked by caterpillars, ants, red spiders, and most significantly, South American leaf blight, which, to this day, limits the number of rubber plantations in this, the tree’s native land.

The next problem was based on cultural differences. The newly planted fields needed hundreds of local workers, who, although well paid, were expected to follow Ford’s patronising vision of a healthy lifestyle. Instead of the local custom of working before and after the roastingly hot middle of the way, Ford’s workers were forced to do the standard company 9-to-5 shift. Similarly, they had to eat American food and take part in weekend activities considered sufficiently wholesome, such as poetry reading and square-dancing. Alcohol was strictly forbidden at work, in the housing estates, or within Fordlandia’s sphere of influence. After a year denied their local customs, the disgruntled workers had enough, and a riot followed, leaving the hapless American staff scurrying into the jungle to escape injury. It was all finally quelled with the arrival of the Brazilian army. 

After threes years, and no significant quantity of rubber to show for it all, Ford did what he should have done from the beginning — hired a trained horticulturist, who ultimately concluded that, in whatever manner the rubber trees were planted, the land was not appropriate for their cultivation. With such humiliating news, anyone less stubborn would have given up, yet Ford purchased another tract of land some fifty miles downstream of the Tapajos river— flatter, dried, better drained, and more suitable for machinery — and started all over again. This time, Ford imported blight-resistant Malaysian rubber trees, and much more horticulture expertise. Still, 10 years later, in 1942, the operation could only produce a paltry 750 tons of latex rubber. Ford’s factories were hoping for almost 40,000.

The final nail in the coffin was the development of synthetic rubber, and in 1945, it was time to admit defeat, although it was not Ford who did so. By that time he was old and ill and had relinquished control of his company to his grandson, Henry Ford II, who closed down the entire rubber operation. The holdings were sold back to the Brazilian government for a patience, leaving a loss of over $20 million (which would be over 10 times that much in today’s terms) — a complete and utter financial disaster. 

Questions

Questions 1-4

Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage One?
Write

• TRUE if the statement agrees with the information
• FALSE if the statement contradicts the information
• NOT GIVEN If there is no information on this

1. Henry Wickham destroyed the Brazilian rubber boom.
2. Rubber trees are well suited to Malaysia.
3. The Tapajos river is very wide.
4. Fordlandia may have succeeded.

Questions 5-10

Complete the table.

Choose NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from the passage for each answer.
 

	Fordlandia's Problems	Result of these
One	first piece of land not 5._______  for rubber trees	no 6._______  of rubber produced
	7.________  were unfamiliar with farming	an unwise 8._________  approach
Three	not following 9.________	a 10.________

Questions 11-13

Complete the sentences.

Choose NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from the passage for each answer.

The natural enemy of rubber trees is 11._______

Plantations definitely need the skills of 12.______.

Fordlandia closed down upon the invention of 13.________.

Answers for Fordlandia With Explanations

Fordlandia reading answers with explanations is given below. Refer to the following answers with an explanation section in order to correct your errors.

(Note: The text in italics mentions the location and referring lines written in the reading passage.)

1. Answer: True

Explanation: In the second last line of paragraph A, “the Brazilian rubber boom crashed, leaving control of the world's supplies”.

2. Answer: True

Explanation: In the last line of paragraph A, “Malaysia (where to this day, most of the world’s natural rubber is still produced)”.

3. Answer: Not given

Explanation: —

4. Answer: False

Explanation: In the last line of paragraph B, “It would be called Fordlandia — ambitious, grandiose, and doomed from the beginning”.

5. Answer: Appropriate

Explanation: In the fourth line of paragraph F, “land was not appropriate for their cultivation”.

6. Answer: Significant Quantity 

Explanation: In the first line of paragraph F, “no significant quantity of rubber to show for it all”.

7. Answer: Company Engineers

Explanation: In the second line of paragraph D, “He naively assumed that his own company engineers”.

8. Answer: Monoculture (farming)

Explanation: In the eighth line of paragraph D, “monocultural farming approaches are dubious at best”.

9. Answer: Local Customs

Explanation: In the last third line of paragraph E, “After a year denied their local customs”.

10. Answer: Riot (followed)

Explanation: In the second last line of paragraph E, “and a riot followed”.

11. Answer: Leaf Blight 

Explanation: In the last line of paragraph D, “South American leaf blight, which, to this day, limits the number of rubber plantations in this, the tree’s native land”.

12. Answer: Trained Horticulture 

Explanation: In the first line of paragraph D, “hired a trained horticulturist”.

13. Answer: Synthetic Rubber

Explanation: In the first line of paragraph G, “The final nail in the coffin was the development of synthetic rubber”.

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