PrepTest 153, Section 1, Question 12
A recent worldwide decline of ocean fishery stocks(470 more words not shown)
The statements in the passage(16 more words not shown)
- AMost farmed fish(2 more words not shown)
- BFarmed and wild(5 more words not shown)
- CPollution is currently(9 more words not shown)
- DMarket forces can(8 more words not shown)
- EThe market for(9 more words not shown)
Reading the passage
The final paragraph shows market incentives working in two directions. More farmed salmon can lower prices, discourage investment in fishing fleets, and eventually reduce fishing. But customers who specifically want wild-caught fish can keep demand and catches high despite the farmed alternatives.
What we’re looking for
Those examples support a claim about how buying decisions and prices affect fishing. They don't tell us that one effect always wins.
Working the answers
- A
High wild-fish inputs among commonly farmed species don't establish that most individual farmed fish are carnivorous. We aren't given the proportions needed to make that claim about the whole farmed population.
- B
The writer discusses nutrients and fish-based feed, not a demonstration that wild and farmed fish eat exactly the same foods. Similar nutritional needs wouldn't by themselves establish identical diets.
- C
Pollution and overfishing both threaten wild populations, but their current damage isn't ranked. Describing both problems doesn't tell us which is worse.
- DCorrect
Lower prices can make catching wild fish less attractive; demand for particular wild-caught fish can keep those catches high. These are market forces pushing in opposite directions, exactly as this answer says.
- E
Calling a market a niche doesn't establish that it will remain small. The writer says such markets have started to develop and can sustain high catches. We aren't given a prediction that their future growth is limited.
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