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  3. In the newsprint market, prices have risen by over 50％ in a matter of months. The cost of paper that feeds into presses around t

In the newsprint market, prices have risen by over 50％ in a matter of months. The cost of paper that feeds into presses around t

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问题     In the newsprint market, prices have risen by over 50％ in a matter of months. The cost of paper that feeds into presses around the world is rising to record highs.
    When times were good, before ads shifted online, newspapers had a supportive partnership with paper mills. As ads departed and circulations fell, newspapers and paper mills are now at the shouting stage.
    Paper mills had the worst of it for years as newspapers reduced pages, went wholly digital or shut for good. The papers were able to hammer down the cost of newsprint from firms fighting for business as demand declined. Price-taking paper mills suffered in silence. Many hesitated to shut massive machines costing hundreds of millions of dollars.
    That hesitance has disappeared; mills are taking out newsprint capacity and diversifying. Many mills are converting machines to make packaging. UPM, a Finnish firm, announced this year the sale of its Shotton newsprint mill in Wales to a Turkish maker of containerboard and packaging. For JCS Volga, a Russian mill, newsprint used to account for 70％ of production; now half of what it makes is packaging.
    The pandemic, with people working from home, meant even fewer newspaper purchases, which depressed demand for newsprint and increased the pain for paper suppliers. In the past 24 months European mills have responded by shutting almost a fifth of their newsprint capacity.
    Then economies reopened. Newsprint demand shot up. That, combined with much reduced capacity and coupled with soaring energy prices, has resulted in a price shock.
    Newspaper firms reckon this amounts to breaking contracts. European newspapers will have to pay newsprint prices that are 50％—70％ higher in the first quarter of 2022 compared with the year before. As for their counterparts in Asia and Oceania, they are facing prices around 25％ to 45％ above their usual level.
    Germany’s print and media industry association has warned that mills are going to force newspapers to dump paper editions, hurting each other in the process. But mills can sell packaging instead. "We’re not going to save the publishing industry by being unprofitable ourselves," says the executive of JCS Volga.
    For some publishers, price rises will wipe out profits. They will need to do further restructuring involving axing titles and layoffs. That will lower demand and nudge the market back towards equilibrium. But newspapers will have more hard conversations about paper. More digitization is one possible reply to the soaring prices of newsprint.
What would paper mills do when suffering hard times?
选项 A、Sell on massive machines.
B、Expand business to packaging.
C、Increase newsprint capacity.
D、Embrace a digitized business.
答案B
解析 细节题。根据题干中的paper mills和hard times可定位至第三、四段。第四段前两句提到mills are taking out newsprint capacity and diversifying. Many mills are converting machines to make packaging (造纸厂正在削减新闻用纸产能，并实现多样化。许多工厂正在改造机器，生产外包装)，B项符合文意，故正确。A项属于无中生有，文中提到造纸厂对于关停大型机器犹豫不决，后来改造了机器，因此不存在卖掉机器的情况，故排除该选项。C项属于是非混淆，造纸厂正在削减新闻用纸产能，故排除该选项。D项属于张冠李戴，第三段第一句提到，有些报纸实现了完全数字化，并非造纸厂转向数字化业务，故排除该选项。故本题答案为B项。
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