PrepTest 153, Section 1, Question 7
A recent worldwide decline of ocean fishery stocks(470 more words not shown)
Which one of the following(9 more words not shown)
- AThe recent decline(15 more words not shown)
- BFish farming has(14 more words not shown)
- CFish farming is(9 more words not shown)
- DThe high catch(14 more words not shown)
- EBecause of their(13 more words not shown)
Reading the passage
We've already seen why fish farming isn't a guaranteed solution to declining wild stocks. Farms can supply food, but they can also pollute habitats and require wild fish as feed. Even available farmed substitutes don't ensure that people stop buying wild-caught fish.
What we’re looking for
Our prediction should capture that tension. Saying only that farms are harmful would lose the potential benefits the writer acknowledges; saying only that they produce more food would lose the criticism.
Working the answers
- A
The writer discusses how farms can contribute to continued decline, not how they caused the entire recent decline. The opening presents depleted wild stocks as a reason fish farming expanded. A turns the discussion into a historical explanation it doesn't give.
- BCorrect
This captures both sides: farming can add fish to our food supply while threatening the wild resources on which that supply also depends. It fits the explicit “possible solution” and “potential contributing factor” contrast, as well as the benefits and limits discussed at the end.
- C
Feeding a growing population helps explain farming's importance in the opening. It isn't the central assessment of farming's effects on wild stocks. “Destined” also converts a prediction about probable importance into certainty.
- D
Continued high wild catches are the final complication, not the whole argument. This leaves out pollution and the wild fish used as feed, as well as the broader potential benefits.
- E
The diet of carnivorous fish explains a high input requirement. We aren't given a full comparison of farming costs and difficulty, and that narrower comparison wouldn't capture the overall assessment anyway.
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