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Multiple Choice, Single Answer

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Pearson Test of English — TestDayTwin Practice
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1.
Multiple Choice, Single Answer

Read the passage and answer the question.

Driverless tractors, equipped with GPS guidance and obstacle-detection sensors, are increasingly used on large arable farms to perform repetitive tasks such as ploughing and seeding. Proponents argue that these machines reduce labor costs and can operate for longer hours than human drivers without fatigue-related errors, such as overlapping passes that waste seed and fuel. However, adoption has been slower on smaller or irregularly shaped farms, where the terrain includes frequent obstacles, tight turns, and inconsistent field boundaries that current navigation systems struggle to interpret reliably. Farmers in these settings report that the technology still requires close human supervision, undermining the labor-saving benefits that make the machines attractive to large-scale operations. As a result, the technology's economic advantages remain unevenly distributed across the farming sector.

Why has adoption of driverless tractors been slower on smaller farms, according to the passage?