Ex 1 make up top sentences to each paragraph of Text 2.

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Jurassic business park

Text 2

Group B: Disadvantages of lean production

Exports are the economy's best hope—and nimble exporters are looking to China and elsewhere

“WE TRY to tell young people that manufacturing isn't messy,” says Mark Wallis, as he walks past the purring machinery at Superior, which makes the rubber O-rings used in plumbing and mechanical devices. The firm, based in soot-free Wimborne in Dorset, employs 160 people on an annual turnover of Ј24m, half of it from foreign sales. Germany is its main export market.

Superior is a type of firm that has supposedly disappeared from Britain. It specialises in designing and testing synthetic rubber compounds. The kind of seal required will depend on the stress and corrosion it has to withstand. The firm is not just an ideas factory: the O-rings are manufactured on-site, too. That way, says Mr Wallis, the business is able to ensure quality and a speedy response to customer needs.

Dorset is a rural county, famous more for its Jurassic coast than whizzy manufacturing. Yet Britain's economic fortunes are pinned on small, export-oriented enterprises of this kind, often found in unlikely places. The prospects for consumer spending look grim. Inflation and tax rises are cutting into already-feeble pay rises; many householders are more minded to pay off debts than to splash out. Public spending is being slashed. That leaves foreign demand as the likeliest motor of GDP growth. The 20% fall in the trade-weighted value of sterling since late 2007 ought to help firms price their exports more appealingly.

Set against that hope are worries that business lacks the clout, skills and credit to thrive. Manufacturing is scarcely bigger than 20 years ago, and its share of the economy has fallen to 12%, lower than in most rich countries. This in part reflects the decline of industries in which Britain no longer has an edge. Production of clothing and footwear, for instance, has almost halved since 1992. But the output of goods less exposed to low-cost competition, such as cars and chemicals, has grown (see chart). Gauges of export orders and investment are now at their highest since the mid-1990s, says the CBI. The hope is that industry is lean rather than merely puny.

Another example of exporting prowess is TDSi, a small Dorset firm that designs access-control systems for offices, airports and rail networks. Sensing an opportunity in export markets, John Davies, the managing director, bought the Poole-based firm in 2005. He closed a division that supplied kit for self-service photocopiers, cutting the workforce by more than half. Revenuesfell by only 15%. They are now rising at a double-digit rate on the back of sales to Asia, where Mr Davies used to work. “Our exports were 25% of sales; they are now 50% and will be 70%,” he says.

Fast-growing China is a key market. This month TDSi won a contract to make control equipment, readers and software for 12 subway stations in Beijing, having already supplied kit for metro systems in Shanghai and Tianjin. It can compete with much larger outfits, such as Siemens and Honeywell, says Mr Davies, because it can closely tailor products to its customers. Unlike Superior, TDSi does not make the stuff it designs. But it is assembled by British contractors rather than in China. Such firms are rather good at making specialist gear to order in small or medium-sized batches. So good, in fact, that fastidious German manufacturers are often clients.

Asia now accounts for the bulk of the sales of DEK, a firm that makes machines used to print circuit boards and the photovoltaic cells in solar panels. Though it has offices abroad and a plant in China, all of DEK's engineering is carried out at its Weymouth headquarters, where a third of its 1,000-strong global workforceare employed. DEK has the knack of reinvention, also a hallmark of the Mittelstand, the smallish firms behind Germany's manufacturing might. It started its solar enterprise three years ago but that now accounts for half of its business. Like bigger companies such as Rolls-Royce, it sells services to go with its machines.

Grip and grin

In fact, a weaker currency often means less to small businesses than the strength of the economies they export to. DEK's input costs and sales are largely based in dollars, says John Knowles, its chairman. Sterling's fall is also a mixed blessing for Superior. The machines used to mould, finish and check its O-rings are made in continental Europe, so have become dearer just when the firm is expanding. The cheaper pound has, however, increased profit marginsat less capital-intensive outfits such as TDSi. It gives such firms leeway to put in keener bids for contracts where there is a chance of repeat business.

The risk is that tight planning laws, miserly banks and skill shortages will limit growth andoffset any benefit from a weaker pound. But nimble and determined firms can surmount these obstacles. Superior has opened a new plant close to its main factory. Mindful of the scarcity of commercial land, it made repeated inquiries about the site before the owner agreed to sell it. It is laying the ground for future recruitment by bolstering links with local schools and seeking apprentices. DEK runs its own training scheme for school-leavers. As for finance, Mr Davies at TDSi reckons companies could do more to help banks understand their business. He updates his bankers every month on the firm's numbers so there are no surprises.

Can government help? Plans to revive government-backed export-credit insurance for small firms are welcomed. But what manufacturers really seem to crave is what Mr Knowles calls “recognition support”, to help open doors to new markets. A grip-and-grin photo opportunity at Downing Street would work wonders for the image of many small manufacturers, at home as well as abroad.

Poole, Weymouth and Wimborne, the Economist, Feb 24th 2011

Ex 2 Provide as many antonyms as possible to the following words (Text2). Use not less than 5 words or word combinations and represent a short talk concerning production management:

Ex 3 Answer the following questions (Text 2):

1.What is a superior firm?

2.What is Dorset famous for?

3.Why do householders pay off debts rather than slash out?

5.What are the reasons of British fall at the market?

6. What is TDSi secret to success?

7.How does a weaker currency mean to small businesses?

8.Why did the cheaper pound has increased profit margins at less capital-intensive outfits?

9.How is Superior laying the ground for future recruitment ?

10.What can help to open doors to new markets?

Ex. 4 Comment on the following quotations from Text 3:

1. “Manufacturing is scarcely bigger than 20 years ago, and its share of the economy has fallen to 12%, lower than in most rich countries”.

2. “Fast-growing China is a key market”.

3. “In fact, a weaker currency often means less to small businesses than the strength of the economies they export to”

4. “But what manufacturers really seem to crave is what Mr Knowles calls “recognition support”, to help open doors to new markets”