 Welcome to Learning English, a daily 30-minute program from the Voice of America. I'm Ashley Thompson. And I'm Dan Novak. This program is designed for English learners, so we speak a little slower, and we use words and phrases, especially written for people learning English. Coming up on the program, Katie Weaver reports on Vietnam's plans to build a microchip factory. Gregory Stockle has a story on how Africa is unlikely to follow East Asia's model of growing manufacturing to reduce poverty. Brian Lin brings us this week's technology report on how many of the world's electrical grids need improvements to meet climate change goals. Later, Jill Robbins and Andrew Smith present the lesson of the day. But first, Vietnam is holding talks with companies that manufacture semiconductors for the electronics industry to increase investment in the country. Two business officials, who did not want to be identified, spoke to Reuters news agency. They said Vietnam aims to build its first factory for computer chips. U.S. industry officials, however, have warned about the high costs. The Southeast Asian country is already a center for electronics. U.S. technology company Intel says it has its largest semiconductor packaging and testing plant in Vietnam. The country is home to several chip-designing software companies. Vietnam is working on a plan to bring in more semiconductor investment, including Foundries. Foundries mainly manufacture computer chips. Vu Thu Thang is head of the Vietnam office of the U.S. ASEAN business council. He told Reuters that meetings with six U.S. chip companies took place in recent weeks, including with factory operators. He did not identify the companies because talks were ongoing. Another official, who did not want to be identified because he was not permitted to talk with the media, spoke with Reuters. The official said talks with possible investors have involved U.S. company Global Foundries and Taiwanese company PSMC. The individual said the aim was to build Vietnam's first chip manufacturing plant, most likely for less complex chips used in cars or for telecommunications uses. The business meetings followed an improvement in diplomatic relations between Vietnam and the U.S. in September. At that time, U.S. President Joe Biden visited Vietnam's capital, Hanoi. Biden's administration described Vietnam as a possible critical player in world semiconductor supply chains. Global Foundries joined a restricted business meeting during Biden's visit after an invitation from the president, the company said. However, a person with knowledge of the subject said the company has not made immediate plans to invest in Vietnam. We do not comment on market rumors, a Global Foundries spokesperson said. PSMC did not answer a request for comment. History officials said meetings so far were mostly to test interest and discuss possible government financial support. Such support would seek to persuade the companies with reasons why it would be good to build a plant there or incentives. They include power supplies, infrastructure, and the availability of a trained workforce. The Vietnamese government has said it wants its first fabrication plant by about 2030. On Monday, the government said chip companies would gain from the highest incentives available in Vietnam. Long Nguyen is a program leader on supply chains at Hanoi's University Vietnam. He told Reuters that Vietnam might also support local companies such as state-owned tech company Vietel to build chip factories with imported equipment. Vietel did not answer a request for comment. Robert Lee is vice president of U.S. Synopsis, a leading chip design firm with operations in Vietnam. He urged the government to think twice before giving out financial support or subsidies to build chip factories. Speaking at Vietnam Semiconductor Summit in Hanoi on Sunday, he said building a foundry could cost as much as $50 billion. He said it would mean providing subsidies competitive with China, the U.S., South Korea, and the European Union. Which has announced spending plans for chip factories valued at between $50 billion and $150 billion. John Newfer is president of the U.S. Semiconductor Industry Association. At the same meeting, he suggested the government center its attention on chip manufacturing in which Vietnam is already strong, like assembling, packaging, and testing. I'm Katie Weaver. A recent study says African countries are less likely to follow East Asia's development model of expanding manufacturing to reduce poverty. The study predicts a decreasing share of factory jobs for most countries by 2050. The Center for Global Development, or CGD, released the study this week. It said there will be fewer factory workers around the world in 2050. The paper predicts that, even in poor countries, with a lot of low-cost labor, manufacturing job growth will slow down. China may be an exception out of the 59 countries modeled in the study. The study said that China will continue to expand its share of manufacturing to 43.8 percent in 2050, from 30 percent in 2018, and 10.5 percent in 1975. The study's writers said that China will continue its strong manufacturing performance producing higher-valued products. This might create some space for developing countries in Africa, Southeast Asia, and South and Central America to start producing the products China will no longer produce. However, it will not be enough for other countries to follow the same development path taken by East Asia in expanding manufacturing. Charles Kenney and Reneal Desinoyaki of CGD said that many countries will move straight from agriculture to services. They say jobs will greatly expand in services because of new technologies, even in countries such as Bangladesh and Ethiopia. There's still a popular idea that low-income countries will progress naturally from being dominated by agriculture to manufacturing-led growth. But mounting evidence suggests that's not going to happen, said Kenney. He said people think that farms are going to empty out across Africa and Asia in the coming years. The study said people are likely to flood into offices and stores, not factories. The study projects worldwide growth through the year 2050. It aims to predict changes in the economies of 59 countries that make up about three-quarters of the world's GDP and population. GDP, or Gross Domestic Product, measures all the goods and services produced in a country in a year. GDP is considered a good measure of the size of a nation's economy. The study projects that even for the lowest-income countries, the number of factory jobs will just keep up with population growth over the next 30 years. And it projects manufacturing will likely stay a small part of most of these countries' economies. Across all low-income countries, manufacturing jobs are projected to remain below 8 percent of total employment. The study projects the share of manufacturing jobs in high-income countries will continue to fall to 8.3 percent by 2050 from 11.4 percent currently. Jobs in private service industries are expected to make up 37 percent of worldwide jobs by 2050 and 26 percent in low-income countries. That is up from about 12 percent currently. I'm Gregory Stockle. The International Energy Agency, IEA, says many world electrical grids will need major improvements to support international climate change goals. In a new report, the IEA calls on nations to invest in aging electrical grid systems. The Paris-based organization works with member governments to help them shape energy policies. The IEA examined electricity grids in countries across the world to produce its report. The report found that, for the most part, electrical grid systems have not kept up with clean energy technologies like solar, wind, electric cars, and heat pumps. One of the main findings is that to meet all national climate and energy goals, about 80 million kilometers of power lines will have to be added or replaced by 2040. The report noted that this amount is equal to the whole existing worldwide electricity grid. The 2015 Paris Climate Agreement has set a goal to limit warming worldwide to 1.5 degrees Celsius since pre-industrial times. Climate scientists believe the way to meet that goal is to reduce the use of greenhouse gases. They say this kind of pollution linked largely to human activities warms the planet. IEA Executive Director Fati Birol spoke to reporters from the Associated Press about the report. He said there are many renewable energy projects waiting to connect to electricity systems, but currently most grids are not equipped to work with the greener technology. Birol said many of the renewable projects are ready or nearly ready to go. If grid changes could be completed, the projects could produce about 1500 gigawatts of power. This is about five times the amount of solar and wind capacity added worldwide last year. Birol said if investments in grid systems do not increase, the report predicts the chance of reaching the Paris Agreement's goal drops sharply. The IEA said such investments need to double to more than $600 billion a year by 2030. But there are difficulties getting new grid improvements approved. The IEA notes that it is not uncommon for a single high-power overhead power line to take five to 13 years to get government approvals in developed economies. Approvals in nations such as China and India can be much shorter, the organization said. One project examined in the report aims to carry wind power from Northern to Southern Germany. First planned in 2014, it was delayed after political opposition to an overhead line meant it was buried instead. Completion of the project is now expected in 2028 instead of 2022. Other important projects are delayed including the 400 kilometer Bay of Biscay connector between Spain and France. Officials expect to finish the work in 2028 instead of 2025. And a line to bring wind power from New Mexico to Arizona and California just started last month after years of delays. I'm Brian Lin. VOA Learning English has launched a new program for children. It is called Let's Learn English with Anna. The new course aims to teach children American English through asking and answering questions and experiencing fun situations. For more information visit our website learningenglish.voanews.com. My name is Anna Matteo. My name is Andrew Smith. And I'm Jill Robbins. You're listening to The Lesson of the Day on the Learning English podcast. Welcome to the part of the show where we help you do more with our series Let's Learn English. The series shows Anna Matteo in her work and life in Washington, D.C. The biggest, the fastest, the youngest, and the oldest. The most, the least, the worst, and the best. All of these expressions you've just heard have that small word that is so important in English. In fact, it's the most common word in all of English. And there it was again. Jill just said the most common. On today's podcast lesson, we're looking at the word the when we use the superlative. The superlative describes something with the highest degree of equality. There it is again. You just said the highest degree. You see, we can't even talk about the superlative without using the word the. Well, it's pretty hard to avoid using the word the. And I think our listeners probably already know about comparing things in English. For example, the Empire State Building in New York City is taller than the Eiffel Tower in Paris. And the Burj Al-Khalifa is the tallest building in the world. We use the suffix ER for comparisons, like X is taller than Y. But what has this got to do with Anna? It seems like we're digressing or getting away from the main topic. We're almost digressing. But Anna mentions some superlatives when she visits a seafood market in lesson 30 of the Let's Learn English series. Listen for the superlative in this example. You will hear the superlative used twice. Hello, Washington DC sits on the Potomac River. This river is important to the history and culture of the city. Today, I am at an outdoor seafood market near the Potomac River. Some say it is the oldest outdoor seafood market in the United States. I am here to buy seafood. Let's see what they have. Excuse me. Can you help me? Sure. What do you need? Pete. Anna. What are you doing here? I work here. You know, it's not easy to be a writer. Yeah, I heard that. Sorry. But this job is great. I work outside, by the river, and I can eat all the free seafood I want. That is great, Pete. In fact, I am here to buy some seafood for my dinner party. You came to the right place. They have the freshest seafood in town. Did you hear the superlative in that last sentence? They have the freshest seafood in town. And a bit earlier, Anna said. Some say it is the oldest outdoor seafood market in the United States. The superlative adds the suffix est to one syllable adjectives or to two syllable adjectives that end in the letter Y, like the word happy. But what about an adjective with many syllables, like the word delicious? We can't say delicious est. That's hard to pronounce. Yeah, when the adjective is longer, usually two or more syllables, we just put the two words the most or the least before it. For example, we could say the most delicious or the least expensive. And here's another example with the adjective wonderful. There's a popular song in the U.S. for the Christmas holiday. It's called It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year. Bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum. Coming back to Anna's visit to the seafood market, a bit later in lesson 30, we hear this. The crabs here are delicious. They are the best because they come from the nearby Chesapeake Bay. Walk this way. How many crabs do you want? I want a dozen crabs. You should get the larger crabs. They have the most meat. You could hear the superlatives the best and the most. And if you were listening carefully, you might have noticed something that seems to break the rule of comparisons. Pete uses the word the before the comparative form with the er suffix. You should get the larger crabs. They have the most meat. Normally, we don't use the word the before the adjective in comparisons. Right. We just say bigger, larger, taller, and so on. So, for example, a simple comparison would be these crabs are larger than those crabs. But if we already can see the two choices and we already know which one is larger, then we identify one group by saying the larger ones. That's right. The word the is used to identify things, among many other uses. It turns out the word the is quite useful in English. That's true. There's another word on a uses that our listeners should notice. It begins with the letter D. Listen. How many crabs do you want? I want a dozen crabs. Pete asks how many. So, we know that the word dozen that spelled D O Z E N is a quantity. A quantity means an amount or a certain number of items. Listeners, do you know how many things are in a dozen? Here's a hint. In the US and other countries, in the grocery store, eggs are often sold by the dozen. And the answer is 12. Well, that was quite exciting. But knowing the expression a dozen or dozens, can be useful and not only when shopping for eggs. Many news reports, including those on the Learning English website, use the word dozen or dozens to describe how many things there are. There's also a well-known movie called Cheaper by the Dozen, based on a book about an American family with 12 children. And remember that there are dozens of episodes of the Let's Learn English series you can watch to help you learn English. And don't forget, on our website, learningenglish.voanews.com, each episode of Let's Learn English comes with a lesson plan you can download to help you learn more or even teach English to others. And so you can get practice with superlatives, write to us at learningenglish at voanews.com, and tell us about something in your town that is the biggest, tallest, oldest, or most interesting thing. And thank you for listening to The Lesson of the Day on the Learning English Podcast. I'm Andrew Smith. And I'm Jill Robbins. And that's our program for today. Join us again tomorrow to keep learning English through stories from around the world. I'm Ashley Thompson. And I'm Dan Novak.