Among the reasons for the decline of New England agriculture in the la

Question

Project SC Butler: Day 31 Sentence Correction (SC1) 
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Among the reasons for the decline of New England agriculture in the last three decades were the high cost of land, the pressure of housing and commercial development, and  basing a marketing and distribution system on importing produce from Florida and California.

(A) basing a marketing and distribution system on importing produce from Florida and California

(B) basing a marketing and distribution system on the imported produce of Florida and California

(C) basing a system of marketing and distribution on the import of produce from Florida and California

(D) a marketing and distribution system based on importing produce from Florida and California

(E) a marketing and distribution system importing produce from Florida and California as its base

NOTE:  IN YOUR ANSWER, PLEASE STATE THE MEANING OF THE QUESTION IN YOUR OWN WORDS .

The  best or excellent answers get kudos , which will be  awarded  after   the answer is revealed.

Prateekj05 · Accepted Answer

Meaning analysis:

The author is stating the reasons for the decline of New England agriculture in the last three decades. These reasons are
 1. the high cost of land, 
2. the pressure of housing and commercial development, and 
3. a marketing and distribution system 
 based on importing produce from Florida and California.

The meaning analysis itself will lead you to the correct answer.
 A,B and C  can be eliminated since a  noun phrase  is needed.

Reasons for the decline of New England agriculture in the last three decades were the  high cost of land ,  the pressure of housing and commercial development , and  *noun phrase* ...

E is very awkward. D is the perfect choice as an answer and sounds right.

Answer should be  D .

aanjumz92 · Answer

The question is essentially talking about three reasons that agriculture declined in New England in the last 30 years. We're looking for a parallel structure here because we have an obvious list of things that need to be similar.  THE  high cost of land..... THE  pressure.... AND  basing....

Notice that the sentences do not begin with parallel markers.

(A)  basing  a marketing and distribution system on importing produce from Florida and California

(B)  basing  a marketing and distribution system on the imported produce of Florida and California

(C)  basing  a system of marketing and distribution on the import of produce from Florida and California

(D)  a marketing and distribution system based on importing produce from Florida and California

(E)  a  marketing and distribution system  importing  produce from Florida and California  as its base

A, B, and C can be eliminated due to the lack of continuity in the entire passage. We need a noun phrase, not a gerund phrase. E is wrong because it is sloppy and wordy. D is concise and the correct answer by POE.

Ypsychotic · Answer

The question states "among the reasons for this were," since it is going to state reasons, three of them it gave earlier and to maintain parallelism, we can eliminate A. B and C. Between D & E, E states that they are importing produce as Florida and California as its base. Seems wordy and nonsensical. So, IMO, option D

adkikani · Answer

The sentence tests parallelism in terms of the reasons for the decline of New England agriculture in the last three decades. What are these reasons? high cost of land, (nouns cost and land connected by and) the pressure of housing and commercial development, and (nouns pressure and development connected by and) marketing and distribution system importing produce from Florida and California. (noun phrase with noun: sytem and verb-ing importing modifying system Ypsychotic

Who are they in your analysis? As per my view in D and E, verb-ed based and importing correctly modifies preceding noun system. The issue with E is: Its is a pronoun with referent to a singular noun. But which noun it refers to: Florida or California? This ambiguity is unaccepted in GMAT. generis aragonn VeritasKarishma AjiteshArun let me know your thoughts.

shubham1985 · Answer

The question really tests your ability to get the parallelism correct in this question. Since the sentence starts with "Among the reasons", you are certain to have more than 2 reasons.
Now, if you look at the statement, the sentence gives you 3 different reasons. 1) the high cost of land 2) the pressure of housing and commercial development 3) basing a marketing and distribution system. The error lies in the 3rd reason since it is not parallel to the other 2.
The first 2 reasons are in the form of "Noun Phrase", so we should look at options that state the 3rd reason in "Noun Phase" form.
 
(A) basing a marketing and distribution system on importing produce from Florida and California - Wrong because of parallelism issue

(B) basing a marketing and distribution system on the imported produce of Florida and California - Wrong because of parallelism issue

(C) basing a system of marketing and distribution on the import of produce from Florida and California - Wrong because of parallelism issue

(D) a marketing and distribution system based on importing produce from Florida and California - Perfect. Keep this choice.

(E) a marketing and distribution system importing produce from Florida and California as its base - Wrong because of meaning error. "System"cannot import produce from Florida and California

Hope the explanation is clear.
Thanks !

Shah10 · Answer

My answer is "D".

The sentence has a smooth parallel structure, and is concise.

aragonn · Answer

adkikani - I have eliminated E on the basis of meaning, among other issues ofcourse. E is employing that system is importing produce. while we are really looking for a system which is based on this idea. A subtle change in meaning. in addition I can't see "as its base" fit in, as you have mentioned in your choice. However without that part i think D is a better choice than E is.

Quote:

(D) a marketing and distribution system based on importing produce from Florida and California

(E) a marketing and distribution system importing produce from Florida and California as its base

generis · Answer

OFFICIAL EXPLANATION My annotations are in blue typeface. • Choices A, B, and C can be faulted for putting a verb phrase, basing . . . where a noun phrase is needed to continue the list of parallel elements, that begins with the high cost of land, the pressure of housing . . . • Also, the "imported produce" in B suggests that the system is based on the produce itself rather than on the practice of importing produce. • In C, the import of produce is unidiomatic. "Importing produce" and the "importation of produce" are both acceptable, and the former is much more likely to show up than the latter. This detail is very small. Use the other basis (absence of parallelism) to eliminate C. • D, the best choice, presents a noun phrase (. . . a marking and distribution system) that completes the list of parallel elements and refers to the act of importing produce . • E also supplies the noun phrase but states illogically that the system imports produce as its base . COMMENTS Welcome to GMAT Club , Ypsychotic (great username) and @Topper87 , and a belated welcome, Shah10

I'm glad that you posted, aanjumz92 amd shubham1985 And of course, I always appreciate posts from longer-term members who consistently make these threads really helpful. There are many good answers! I really like the analysis. I still have the impression that "meaning in your own words" isn't quite understood. This part from aanjumz92 is an excellent start: The question is essentially talking about three reasons that agriculture declined in New England in the last 30 years. Here is the correct answer, D, inserted into the sentence: Among the reasons for the decline of New England agriculture in the last three decades were the high cost of land, the pressure of housing and commercial development, and a marketing and distribution system based on importing produce from Florida and California Rewrite : Three facts help account for the 30-year decline of agriculture in New England: costly land that farmers couldn't afford, less land available for farming, and infrastructure/system whose basis includes having imported too much produce from other states, thus pushing New England produce farmers out of the market. I know that it's a pain in the neck to rewrite meaning. I don't always ask for meaning. The good news is that no matter how fluent we think we are, if we write down meaning while practicing, we start absorbing both SC patterns (invaluable) and the subtle traps or tricks that GMAC uses. HERE is an interesting article written by a guy who had excellent command of grammar but who botched SC so badly that he got a tutor! Among other things, he stresses that active reading is (1) imperative and (2) hard to develop. Guess what having to write down the meaning requires?

Prateekj05 , aanjumz92 , and shubham1985 have excellent answers. Kudos,

brianmontanaweb · Answer

A, B, and C all break parallelism since the sentence is "were the cost, the pressure, and". We need a noun to start the last reason.

E is using "importing" which is incorrect since the reasons were in the past

D is the most correct

VerbalBot · Answer

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Among the reasons for the decline of New England agriculture in the la

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GMAT Sentence Correction (SC - EA only) Questions

Among the reasons for the decline of New England agriculture in the la

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