Reading Comprehension

PT153 · S1 · P2 · Q12 Fish Farming

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A recent worldwide decline of ocean fishery stocks has stimulated rapid growth in cultivated production of fish and shellfish, usually known as fish farming.

Topic

The impact of fish farming on global ocean fishery stocks

Framework

Problem / Solution

Main Point

While fish farming has grown rapidly and seems like a solution to declining wild fish stocks, it is also part of the problem due to pollution, ecological disruption, and heavy reliance on wild fish as feed. So, fish farming is both potentially helpful and harmful for ocean fisheries. (The "Most Valuable Sentence" appears at the end of the first paragraph: )

P1: The Rise and Paradox of Fish Farming

Fish farming is booming as ocean fisheries decline and now supplies a large portion of seafood eaten by people. Some believe it could save wild fish stocks, but there’s not much proof—it might help, but could also make things worse.

P2: Environmental Impacts of Intensive Fish Farming

High-density fish farming can cause big problems: it pollutes waterways, spreads diseases, and lets non-native species escape, all of which can hurt wild fish populations and damage natural habitats.

P3: Reliance on Wild Fish as Feed

Many farmed fish, especially carnivores like salmon, need to eat a lot of wild fish to grow—often more than the resulting harvest. This means that farming some species puts even more pressure on wild fish stocks.

12.

The statements in the passage provide the most support for the view that the author believes which one of the following?

Most farmed fish are carnivorous.
Too Strong: most
The overly precise modifier most is dangerous in Reading Comp (and on Necessary Assumption and Most Supported in LR). Can we get that precise? Do we know that more than 50% of farmed fish are carnivorous? The end of the 3rd paragraph mentions carnivorous fish that are farmed (such as salmon), but it never says that they're more than 50% of farmed fish.
6% picked this
Farmed and wild fish consume
Too Strong: same Opposite, if anything
The concept same is very dangerous in Reading Comp (and Necessary Assumption and Most Supported in LR). If we said the word "identical" instead, it would sound as extreme as it is. The passage actually suggests, in the 3rd paragraph, that farmed fish are eating some unnatural diet of vegetable matter that doesn't supply enough vitamins, so they add fish meal and fish oil (which would never be found in the wild) to the diet of the farmed fish.
8% picked this
Pollution is currently more damaging
Unknown Comparison: more damaging
We have no way to tally up all the damage points inflicted by pollution and all the damage points inflicted by overfishing and measure them against each other. And the passage never makes a comparative judgment about which one causes more damage overall.
6% picked this
Correct
Market forces can either encourage
Why this is right
When we say "X is either Y or Z" we mean that "at least one of Y and Z" is true about X. So technically you can support this being a true claim as long as you can support encourage or discourage. But they had in mind dual support, because the author was listing a lot of different pros and cons. In one way, farm fishing is good: The 2nd sentence of the final paragraph explains that as fish farming increases for salmon, there will be more salmon supply on the market, so the market price of salmon will go down, which will deter people who might otherwise have thought to invest in wild salmon fishing. Kathleen was thinking, "Is the big money in salmon fishing fleets?" and was thinking about investing her inheritance in that sector, until she looked into the numbers and saw that the profit margins were razor thin, now that fish farming has lowered the price consumers are expecting to pay for salmon. Because Kathleen decides to not invest in a fishing fleet, it "reduces fishing efforts", which allows wild fisheries to build back their population. Market forces discouraged Kathleen from overfishing ocean fisheries. In the final sentence of the passage, market forces encourage overfishing. Niche markets open up for wild-caught fish ... people go on anniversary dinners to eat their $500 / bowl of shark fin soup. The fact that rich people lust for the forbidden fruit of these wild caught fish means that economic incentives to go fishing for them remain: "causing their catch rates to remain high even as the production of viable formed substitutes has increased".
Skill tested: Author Opinion · how this choice captures the passage's function is the move to repeat next time.
78% picked this
The market for wild-caught fish
Too Optimistic
When the author talks about the market for wild-caught fish in the last sentence, she doesn't sound optimistic, like "no worries ... the market is likely to remain small". Instead, she's saying "even these benefits may in the end be lost!" because of these niche markets. She isn't necessarily saying the market will become a medium sized one, but we have no touchable support for this optimism that it will remain small. The tone of this sentence is "PIVOT back into pessimism and alarm".
2% picked this

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