[单项选择]

Passage Three
It remains to be seen whether the reserves of raw materials in the year 2000 will be sufficient to supply a world economy which will have grown by five hundred percent. Southeast Asia alone will have an energy consumption five times greater than that of Western Europe in 1970. Incidentally, if the underdeveloped countries started using up petrol at the same rate as the industrialized areas, then world reserves would be exhausted by 1990.
All this only goes to show just how important it is to set up a plan to conserve and divide up fairly natural resources on a worldwide scale.
This is a matter of life and death because world population is expanding at an incredible rate. By the middle of the next century population will expand every year by as much as it did in the first 1,500 years after Christ. In the southern, poor parts of the globe, the figures are enough to make your hair stand on end. Even supposing that steps are taken to stabi
A. the figures are too surprised to believe
B. the figures seem to be so high that we think them to be unacceptable
C. the figures are so big that we may be surprised at them
D. it seems that the figures are high enough