In the most common procedure for harvesting forage crops such as alfal

Question

In the most common procedure for harvesting forage crops such as alfalfa, as much as 20 percent of the leaf and small-stem material, which is the most nutritious of all the parts of the plant, shattered and fell to the ground.

(A) which is the most nutritious of all the parts of the plant, shattered and fell

(B) the most nutritious of all parts of the plant, shatter and fall

(C) the parts of the plant which were most nutritious, will shatter and fall

(D) the most nutritious parts of the plant, shatters and falls

(E) parts of the plant which are the most nutritious, have shattered and fallen

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JOURNAL ARTICLE
SCIENCE AND THE CITIZEN
Scientific American
Vol. 232, No. 4 (April 1975), pp. 53-57
Published by: Scientific American, a division of Nature America, Inc.
https://www.jstor.org/stable/24949773
Page Count: 9

The traditional procedure for harvesting a forage crop such as alfalfa usually entails making three trips through the field: one to cut the crop, one (sometimes bypassed) to rake it so that it will dry more thoroughly and one to pick it up. The procedure results in certain losses; for example, as much as 20 percent of the dried leaf and small-stem material, which is the most nutritious part of the plant, can shatter and fall to the ground. The proteins and amino acids of forage crops are not fully utilized in another sense: since such crops can be digested only by ruminants, the nutrients in them are not directly available to other animals, including man. In an effort to exploit the full potential of forage crops an interdisciplinary group at the University of Wisconsin has developed a program for extracting proteins and amino acids from such plants in the form of juice, producing a concentrate that is suitable for a wide range of animals and leaving a solid residue that is still nutritious for ruminants.

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Official Answer

D

mikemcgarry · Accepted Answer

Dear Fame , I'm happy to help, my friend. :-)

I believe (B) is listed, as the OA, certainly on this page and perhaps by source, and I strongly disagree with this. This is a very tricky point about percent. Percent of something countable (e.g. " 20% of people ", " 20% of cars ", etc.) is construed as plural --- we are talking about some number of people, some number of cars, etc. But, percent of something uncountable (e.g. " 20% of the time ", " 20% of Earth's atmosphere ", etc.) is construed as singular ---- it a single "lump" of the stuff --- a single chunk of time, a single chunk of the atmosphere, etc. Here, it's percent of " material ", an uncountable noun. This question is particularly tricky because it's " 20 percent of the leaf and small-stem material " ---- " material " is uncountable, so the entire percent phrase is singular. If the wording had been " 20 percent of the leaves and small-stems ", those are countable, so that percent phrase would have been plural. Because the percent phrase mentions the potentially countable things ( leaves , stems ), I can see that many folks would be tempted to conclude that it's a percent of a countable thing, and that choice leads to what I could call the trap answer of (B) . In fact, " leaf and small-stem material ", and any kind of " material ", is uncountable ---- we would say " how much material ?", never " how many material ?" ----- so, because we have a percent of something uncountable, it is construed as a singular subject and therefore demands the singular verb, which is precisely what (D) has. In my view, (D) is the best answer. BTW, here's a recent blog that touches on some related issues: https://magoosh.com/gmat/2013/gmat-sente ... ve-idioms/ The best answer is not the answer listed by the source. That, I think, is at the root of all the back-and-forth on this page. I believe the source is one of those free online question banks. Are you familiar with the sarcastic phrase, "free and worth it?" I think that's the core of the problem. Mike :-)

tennis1ball · Answer

it is D.

as much as. much here means the subject is uncountable, so the verb must be singular.

SmashingGrace · Answer

I think it's D!

A & E are out - 'shattered and fell' - we can't use Simple Past when we're talking about a common procedure which generally happens.

C - ridiculous 'the parts of the plant which  were  most nutritious,  will shatter and fall  - mixing Simple Past and Simple Future

B & D - even without considering plural vs singular it's clearly D -  'the most nutricious of  all parts '   in B is clearly redundant

(B) the most nutritious of  all parts  of the plant, shatter and fall
(D) the most nutritious parts of the plant, shatters and falls

huntgmat · Answer

In the most common procedure for harvesting forage crops such as alfalfa, as much as 20 percent of the leaf and small-stem material,  which is the most nutritious of all the parts of the plant, shattered and fell  to the ground.
(A) which is the most nutritious of all the parts of the plant, shattered and fell
  which  should clearly refer back to a noun.
We are talikng about "procedure" that still exists, shattered and fell indicates
that the problem doesn't exist anymore 
(B) the most nutritious of all parts of the plant, shatter and fall
 Hold it 
(C) the parts of the plant which were most nutritious, will shatter and fall
 Eliminated , why future tense ??? 
(D) the most nutritious parts of the plant, shatters and falls
 Hold it 
(E) parts of the plant which are the most nutritious, have shattered and fallen
 Eliminated , incorrect

Just left with B abd D. 
For me, "leaf and small-stem material" sounds singullar.
So 20 % of singular = singular.
Ex 20% of a Choclate = singular. So,
I will go for

nitya34 · Answer

"20 percent of the leaf and small-stem material"
--singular
Q is more to do with TENSE Usage
is OA D?

priyankurml · Answer

Could you please justify why you think that "20 percent of the leaf and small-stem material" = singular ?

20% of singular = singular  
20% of plural = plural  
but is  leaf and small-stem material  = singular? WHY?
"Leaf" is noun and "material" is another noun = should be plural....?!

ritula · Answer

very gud question +1 frm me
Earlier i also chose B thinking leaf and stem material as plural. 
But after going t hru the link ,which Nitya posted, Leaf and stem is the adjective for material (singular). Hence it should be D

Indien · Answer

I selected B as well.

on the questions of "20 percent of the leaf and small-stem material," looks at the two examples from  New York Times  below:

... Upwards of 10 percent of adults suffer from some sort of parasomnia ...
... 60 percent of Americans think the country is heading in the wrong direction ...

Looks like NYT considers it plural.

gmatbull · Answer

The the items in bold are both preceded by the "percent of" construction.
Note that both items (adults & Americans) are countable nouns - so, they take plural verb form
Where the items/subjects are non-count nouns, they generally take the singular verb form.
for example, 
"about 21 percent of the   atmosphere is   made of oxygen" 
"only a dismal 10 percent of the   women were   saved from from drowning"

Don't know whether these examples make any sense.

SudiptoGmat · Answer

Subject : 20 percent of the leaf and small-stem material

The sentence talks about 
We need a appositive here the most common procedure for harvesting forage crops. So it should be in present tense. 
Subject is singular --- 20% of something.

so D is the only option here.

papillon86 · Answer

Found it somewhere.......The following answers all my questions and doubts.

as much as 20% of the leaf and small-stem material..

Keep the following in mind

much is always used for non-countable nouns(ie. singular nouns)
many for plural/countable ones

So we need a singular verb here..which is supplied by D. shatters and falls
Hence the answer

:beer

Thanks

cabelk · Answer

Phrases such as
...half of...
...part of...
...20% of...
are singular when they refer to a mass or to non-countable objects,
and plural when they refer to a number of individual items or to countable objects.

For example,
20% of the cards ARE missing.
20% of the deck IS missing.

For the GMAT question stated in the original post,
D is correct and can be rephrased as
...as much as 20% of the...material...shatters and falls...
Note: The phrase "leaf and small-stem" is an adjective phrase that refers to the word "material".

B is incorrect and can be rephrased as
...as much as 20% of the...material...shatter and fall.
To correct B, we can rewrite it as
...as many as 20% of the...materials...shatter and fall.

ANS: D

noboru · Answer

Are you sure?
For me the subject is "20 percent of the leaf"   and   "small-stem material" (that is, two nouns joined by AND), so it is therefore plural.

Could you explain this?
Many thanks in advance.

EducationAisle · Answer

The subject here is  material  (How do we know? Because the non-underlined portion says :  material  and not  material  s   ).

Material  is always singular; and if  material  is singular,  20% of the material  would also be singular.

Ok. Now as many would wonder, how do we know that  material  is the subject and not  leaf and small-stem .

Well, that’s because the only plausible way to read it is: 20 % of   the   (leaf and small-stem) material.

fameatop · Answer

Hi Mike, 
Can you kindly let us know the answer for the question coz as per me the answer should be B. 
Waiting eagerly to hear from you. 
Regards, Fame

immaculatesahai · Answer

+1 for D.
Question testing modifiers. We just need to keep in mind "What is being modified here". Since both leaf and small stem material are modified, D is defntly the best option.

mikemcgarry · Answer

Dear priyankur_saha , You are parsing this as " thing #1 and thing #2 ", where thing #1 = " leaf " and thing #2 = " small-stem material ". I assert, though that what we have here are two kinds of material --- " leaf ( material )" and " small-stem material ". I point out --- " 20 percent of the leaf " by itself makes no sense --- what leaf? are we talking about a single leaf on a single alfalfa plant?? That's absurd! Instead, I assert we are talking about " 20 percent of the leaf ( material )" and " 20 percent of the .... small-stem material ". Thus, " leaf and small-stem " here is a noun modifier. The noun itself is simply " material ", and this is clearly a singular noun. More to the point, it's an uncountable noun, and percents of uncountable nouns are construed as singular . Does all this make sense? Mike :-)

daagh · Answer

The points to recall are:

1. This is a general fact; therefore, simple present is required. 
2. ‘as much as’ in the non-underline part makes it clear that the subject 20% is singular and not plural.

In the light of these,

(a) which is the most nutritious of all the parts of the plant, shattered and fell ---  past tense is wro ng 
(b) the most nutritious of all parts of the plant, shatter and fall –  20% is singular, therefore, the plural verbs shatter and fall are incorrec t. 
(c) the parts of the plant which were most nutritious, will shatter and fall---  ‘Which were’ and ‘will shatter’ – awful  
(d) the most nutritious parts of the plant shatters and falls. ---  Correct form and tense of the verb; best choice.  
e) parts of the plant which are the most nutritious, have shattered and fallen ---  ‘have shattered and fallen’ is a wrong tense.

himanshukamra2711 · Answer

acc to me

quesn stem says alfalfa and as much as 20% of the leaf and small stem material of the same crop ie alfalfa,hence it is not a compound subject and the singular subject becomes as much as 20% of the leaf and small stem material ----so singular shatters and falls

In the most common procedure for harvesting forage crops such as alfal

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In the most common procedure for harvesting forage crops such as alfal

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