piffling

音标发音

Because markets for land are so ill-developed in Africa and governments so weak, rents are piffling: $2 per hectare per year in Ethiopia; $5 in Liberia.
因为在非洲土地市场发展很不完善，另外政府很软弱，租金非常便宜：在埃塞俄比亚每公顷每年的租金是2美元；在利比里亚是5美元。
He found those with a lower base level of the hormone tended to prefer immediate payment, even when the sum in question was piffling compared with the promised future compensation.
他发现那些具有更低水平糖皮质激素的人倾向于选择即时报酬，即使即时报酬数目和未来承诺的补偿相比微不足道，结果也是这样。
That now seems probable, despite Mr Brown’s initial, indefensible preference for a closed version: with Mr Bush departed and Saddam dead, the case for privacy was always piffling.
这样的公开调查现在看来很可能要进行了，尽管布朗开始倾向于不公开调查：随着布什卸任和萨拉姆被绞死，隐私这一因素变得微不足道了。

Compared with this row, other trade niggles—such as those over genetically modified maize or hormones in beef—are piffling.
ECONOMIST: That awkward relationship
But the violence in Yangon exposed the enormous credibility gap between ASEAN's grandiose talk and its piffling achievements.
ECONOMIST: Asia.view: Bad neighbour The

If you describe something as piffling, you are critical of it because it is very small or unimportant.