Reading ComprehensionDifficulty: Medium

PT153 S1 P2 Q10 Explanation

Fish Farming

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TopicsInferenceScience

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Passage

A recent worldwide decline of ocean fishery stocks has stimulated rapid growth in cultivated production of fish and shellfish, usually known as fish farming. Between 1987 and 1997, for example, global fish production from farming doubled. Fish farming produces a quarter of all fish and shellfish eaten by humans, and, as global solution, but also a potential contributing factor, to the continued decline of ocean fishery stocks worldwide.

In the first place, the more intensive forms of fish farming, oriented toward high-volume production, threaten the sustainability of ocean fisheries through water pollution and ecological disruption. Intensive fish farming usually involves the enclosure of fish in a secure system; population densities are typically high, resulting in the generation of large amounts pathogens can all ensue, seriously damaging ocean and coastal resources and, ultimately, wild fishery stocks.

Even more important, intensive farming of many species of fish requires large inputs of fish meal and fish oil in order to supply fatty acids that vegetable matter lacks or essential amino acids that it inadequately supplies, like lysine and methionine. For the ten species of fish most commonly farmed, an average carnivorous species requires up to 5 kilograms of wild fish for every kilogram of fish produced.

Expanding farm production does have the potential to alleviate some of the pressure on wild fishery stocks. For example, increasing the farm production of fish like salmon can reduce prices, deterring investment in fishing fleets and, over time, reducing fishing efforts. Similarly, other farmed fish like tilapia and channel catfish provide alternatives catch rates to remain high even as the production of viable farmed substitutes has increased.

What this question is testing

Inference

Your task

Find what must be true based on what the passage or stimulus states.

Common trap

Answers that are plausible or likely but not actually guaranteed by the text.

Winning move

Keep only the choice the statements fully support — eliminate anything that requires an extra assumption.

Reading along? Open the full official question in LawHub — we show a fragment here and keep the reasoning in our own words.

The question
10.

The information in the passage most strongly supports which one of the

Answer choices

  1. Out of Scope: non-human cause4% picked this

    Any further decline in ocean fishery stocks would not be caused entirely

    This language is super soft and lovable, so we should give this answer a good chance. To support that "any further X would not be caused entirely by Y", we would just need to be able to say that "a further instance of X would be caused in part by Z"? Can we say that a further decline in ocean fishery stocks will be caused at least in part by something unrelated to human activities? We don't have anything in the passage that sounds like a nonhuman cause of decline to ocean fishery stocks.

  2. Too Strong8% picked this

    The best way to reduce the price of wild-caught fish is to put a farmed variety of the

    Too Strong: best Unknown Comparison Goes Against Passage Not only is this way too strong to be derivable (the passage does not rank all the different ways to reduce the price of wild-caught fish), it is somewhat undermined by the very end of the passage. It says that putting a farmed variety of salmon on the market can reduce prices of wild-caught salmon, deterring investment in fishing fleets and efforts to get wild-caught salmon. But then the passage says, "nonetheless, even these benefits may in the end be lost". That doesn't sound like rousing praise for "the best way".

  3. Too Strong: unlikely9% picked this

    If fish farming does not continue to increase, then it is unlikely that worldwide human protein

    This answer could be rephrased, "In order for world protein needs to be met, we will probably have to continue increasing fish farming." Our author isn't even a big fan of fish farming, so it would be weird for him to be communicating that it's likely to be essential to meeting worldwide protein needs. We were told that fish farming "will probably become even more important in supplying human protein needs",

  4. Too Strong3% picked this

    Most consumers do not perceive a difference in taste between wild-caught and farmed varieties of the

    Too Strong: most Out of Scope: consumer perception Unknown Comparison The passage never talks about consumers' perceptions of farmed vs. wild fish. We don't know whether most people can perceive a difference or not.

  5. Correct77% picked this

    The use of wild fish to meet the nutritional needs of farmed fish could result in the overfishing

    Why this is right

    This answer reflects the gist of the 3rd paragraph. We won't find its essence contained in any one sentence, but instead in the structural logic of the passage. The end of the 1st paragraph is saying, "Fish farming is a possible solution, but also a potential contributing factor, to the continued decline of ocean fishery stocks worldwide". The 2nd paragraph discusses one reason why fish farming can contribute to the decline of worldwide ocean fishery stocks: "In the first place ... fish farming can hurt fishery stocks via pollution and ecological disturbance" Then the 3rd paragraph discusses another reason why fish farming can contribute to the decline of worldwide ocean fishery stocks: "Even more important ... fish farming involves feeding those fish 1.9 kg of wild fish for ever 1 kg of farmed fish produced." So the 3rd paragraph is saying that this "net loss" we experience through fish farming (we spend 1.9 kg of wild fish to get 1.0 kg of farmed fish) is the more important reason why fish farming is a potential contributing factor to the continued decline of ocean fishery stocks worldwide.

    Skill tested: Inference · how this choice captures the passage's function is the move to repeat next time.

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