One proposal for preserving rain forests is to promote the adoption of

Note these questions are based on the same passage found in GMAT Prep but with different questions: https://gmatclub.com/forum/gmat-prep-rc ... 19458.html
OG 2019 ID's:
RC00455-03 for OG 2019 411
RC00455-05 for OG 2019 412

Hello, Nonktp. I would be happy to offer to offer some insights into my approach on this question. Before I jump into a passage, I typically scan the first question so that I can go into reading the passage with some sort of frame in mind, apart from main idea/authorial presence concerns. The question:


First off, a suggest or inference question does not give you license to "read between the lines," as my students sometimes tell me. Although that interpretation may be accurate with other reading tasks, on the GMAT™, inference means one of two things:

1) What does the passage state, possibly in a slightly different manner (i.e. using synonyms for a few words)?

2) What does the passage state, perhaps forcing you to cobble together information from one sentence or paragraph and information from another, when the two bits are not combined as such in the passage?

Yeah, that is it. The closer you stick to the passage, the more questions you will answer correctly. Stick to the keywords of the question stem, and match them to their counterparts in the passage, a simple yet highly effective strategy. Here, our keywords are security of land tenure and Tawahka society. Thus, we have to make sure our answer is accurate on both fronts. We cannot project any information from one key phrase onto the other. With that out of the way, on to our responses.


Like just about anyone else, I hate long-winded answer choices. They present numerous opportunities to get sidetracked. But here, I cannot find anything to argue against. Why? Because the passage states in the penultimate sentence,

Researchers also measured land-tenure security: in Tawahka society, kinship ties are a more important indicator of this than are legal property rights, so researchers measured it by a household’s duration of residence in its village.

In Tawahka Society, it is clear that kinship ties matter, in terms of land-tenure security. Furthermore, researchers measured [land-tenure security] by how long a household had established residence in its village. The answer choice and the line from the passage match, almost verbatim. What more could you want in an answer?


Note the strong, judgmental language. Quite often, such answer choices take an idea too far, and this one is no different. The passage does not indicate that land-tenure security is unimportant. If it did, then what would be the point in the researchers studying land-tenure security? Rather, the passage tells us that another factor, namely kinship ties via duration of residence, is a more important indicator of land-tenure security than are legal property rights. More important does not suggest that the alternative is unimportant.


I will be honest and admit that I did not even untangle the first part before eliminating this answer choice based on the second part. The latter portion here is twisting words, and no such comparison between duration of residence and kinship ties is made in the passage. Again, the researchers used duration of residence and kinship ties in tandem to measure land-tenure security in Tawahka society. I like to say that if you can argue definitively against anything in an answer choice, as long as you are keeping an eye on the passage, then that is enough to see off that answer. I will leave the former part for another time, perhaps. (The clock would have been ticking if I had not already eliminated the answer and moved on.)


The last line of the passage presents information that flies in the face of this statement:

[The researchers] found that longer residence correlated with more adoption of improved plant varieties but less adoption of chemical herbicides.

If that does not seal the deal, then I am not sure how much more proof you need.


These conditionals, which you can interpret as saying only if, are getting in the way here, not to mention that this is all pure speculation. The passage presents ways in which the Tawahka society operates, regarding the security of land tenure, by not placing an emphasis on legal property rights. This answer kind of reminds me of the different cases in formal logic in which a statement if p then q can be reinterpreted, sometimes with clearly incorrect conclusions, into the inverse (if not p then not q), converse (if q then p), and contrapositive (if not q then not p). We do not need to waste our time sorting out what could be true when the passage tells us what is already going on.

I hope that helps answer your question. Good luck with your studies.

- Andrew

This how I would go about answering this questions. As I'm reading, I want to make a note of few points mentioned in the paragraph..

. The study phrase gives you multiple combinations such as educated or not, non land wealth, inheritance through kin,.. blah.. I would skim through these scenarios...

Next, I would read the question and go back and re-read the multiple combinations of the study one-by-one and you would come across the following phrase -

Using the two quoted phrase, you should be able to select D.

//Kudos please, if the above explanation is good

tricky and nasty passage, though is short

A

Studies have shown that farmers in developing countries who have achieved certain levels of education, wealth, and security of land tenure are more likely to adopt such technologies. But these studies have focused on villages with limited land that are tied to a market economy rather than on the relatively isolated, self-sufficient communities

As you can se you can not generalize the study


B

such as improved plant varieties and use of chemical herbicides,

is the contrary , so C is the exception

C

Researchers also measured land-tenure security: in Tawahka society, kinship ties are a more important indicator of this than are legal property rights, so researchers measured it by a household’s duration of residence in its village. They found that longer residence correlated with more adoption of improved plant varieties but less adoption of chemical herbicides.

pretty much clear

D

Ready availability of uncultivated land tends to decrease local farmers’ incentive to adopt new agricultural technologies that would reduce their need to clear new land for cultivation.

Enhancing the productivity of the land owned and not going to cultivate other lands; indeed the gist of the passage


Hope is clear
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Question 2 asks what line 1's proposal doesn't do, line 1's proposal is to preserve rain forests by helping local farmers through a few methods.
a lot of answer choices are word-by-word, so it's quick elimination

A: adopt new technology <- it's covered, the proposal is supposed to promote new technologies
B: grow plant varieties <- it's covered, one of the new technologies is plant varieties+
C: decrease herbicides <- OA, line 1 does mention improved use of chemical herbicides, but it never mentioned whether improved = decreased herbicides, I don't even know what herbicides are
D: increase productivity <- the proposal's promotion of new tech will increase productivity
E: reduce their need to clear new land for cultivation <- the proposal slows deforestation by reducing demand for new cropland



Question 3 is very tricky because it's incredibly wordy and also because OP didn't point out where line 27 is.
I assumed that the study refers to


The question asks what we can imply from this statement. Take note that leaps of logic is prohibited and GMAT wants us to pick the most boring and droning answer.

let's take a look at some answers, we'll scan out some keywords so we don't drown:



refers to land security and household duration, didn't introduce anything out-of-scope, looks like a winner.




I stopped at land tenure unimportant, kinship is more important than legal property rights (for indicating land security), but they didn't say anything about land tenure being unimportant.




line 27 refers kinship ties as an indicator of land security, the receptivity is not taken into consideration
some might assume that land security = more reception, but the article didn't say anything about secure farmers adopting new technologies
the only mention of receptivity is based on education, language skills and non-land wealth




see C


there is no mention of any farmer's reception on land tenure, we don't know what the farmers actually liked, the research is only talking about measuring land security

Hi,

That helped a lot! Thank you for the detailed explanation.

Regards
Soumya

Is the difficulty level, which is 600-700 right now, of the passage correct?

In Q4, I was stuck among B,C and D. Can someone please guide why B and C are wrong.
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The findings of the study mentioned in the highlighted text, if valid for rain-forest regions in general, suggest that which of the following is an obstacle most likely to be faced by those wishing to promote rain-forest preservation by implementing the proposal mentioned in line 1?

Case study scenario is assumed to be valid for rain forest regions in general.

A. Lack of legal property rights tends to discourage local farmers from investing the time and resources required to successfully implement new agricultural technologies.
They gave more importance to kinship ties than legal property rights. This is not true.
B. The ability to evaluate the wider economic ramifications of adopting new agricultural technologies depends on a relatively high level of formal education.
farmers with certain level of education are known to adopt new tech but neither ability to evaluate ramifications is mentioned nor high level of formal education. Incorrect.
C. Isolation from the market economy tends to restrict local farmers’ access to new agricultural technologies that could help them to increase their productivity.

Quote:

studies have focused on villages with limited land that are tied to a market economy rather than on the relatively isolated, self-sufficient communities with ample land characteristic of rain-forest regions.

having only said this, info in option C cannot not be deduced from passage.
D. Ready availability of uncultivated land tends to decrease local farmers’ incentive to adopt new agricultural technologies that would reduce their need to clear new land for cultivation.
This is mentioned in below sentence in passage.

Quote:

but availability of uncultivated land reduced the incentive to employ the productivity-enhancing technologies.

E. Traditions of self-sufficiency and reliance on kinship ties tend to diminish local farmers’ receptivity to new agricultural technologies introduced by people from outside the local community
self sufficiency may discourage framers to new tech but we don't have reason to say that kinship ties can result in such cases.
people from inside or outside the community is out of scope.

-The author talks about a proposal for preserving rain forests
-The author then describes potential reasons why the proposal might not be accepted in certain regions
- He illustrates the above point with the example of the Tawahka people

1. The author clearly mentions that the proposal will not work under conditions where an ample amount of uncultivated land is available. Hence Option (D) is the best answer choice.

2. the adoption of new agricultural technologies, such as improved plant varieties and use of chemical herbicides, which would increase productivity and slow deforestation by reducing demand for new cropland
Answer C

3. "in Tawahka society, kinship ties are a more important indicator of this than are legal property rights, so researchers measured it by a household’s duration of residence in its village."
The above excerpt indicates that kinship ties are related to the duration of the household's residence it its village. Hence option (A) is the right answer.

4."But these studies have focused on villages with limited land that are tied to a market economy rather than on the relatively isolated, self-sufficient communities with ample land characteristic of rain-forest regions."

The above suggests that an availability of land might prove to be a hindrance for the implementation of the suggested proposal. Hence option (D) is the right answer.
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Can you please explain how did we arrived at option C for Ques 2? Why option E is wrong ?

HI GMATNinja, mikemcgarry, egmat, sayantanc2k, RonPurewal, DmitryFarber, MagooshExpert (Carolyn),

ccooley, GMATNinjaTwo, SarahPurewal

Can you please help me with this question?


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Hi NandishSS!

Happy to help

For primary purpose questions like this, I like to break the passage down into super simple parts, based on what the author is doing. Let's do that here:



-author is presenting a proposal, introducing the topic



-author is providing more detail, based on certain studies



-author is questioning the relevance of those original studies



-author is providing a lot of evidence that contradicts those original studies for specific situations

Now, let's look at it all together, visually -- what does the author spend the most time doing? Often, that's a really good indication of the "primary purpose". The majority of the passage is used to provide evidence about specific situations that question the relevance of the original studies to those specific situations. Let's now look back at the answer choices to see which one of those fits the best. The one that matches best is D: present the results of new research suggesting that previous findings concerning one set of conditions may not be generalizable to another set of conditions.

Does that make sense? If not, let me know
-Carolyn
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Increasing productivity leads to a conclusion that more yield per acre could be obtained and therefore, the need to reduce the land for cultivation is implied in it. We need to find an option that clearly states the correct answer, without any doubt.

The author has mentioned importance of "improved plant varieties and use of chemical herbicides" -- This shows that the author has not agreed to reducing the use of chemical herbicides.

Hello Moderators ( mikemcgarry, GMATNinja, GMATNinjaTwo, workout, Gnpth, broall ) / Experts,

Please tag this passage with the appropriate difficulty level. Passage : One proposal for preserving rain forests is to promote the adop OG2019.

In my personal opinion its a nice GMAT read. I really liked the information flow (although got injured in few of the lines ). But, the tremendous volume of words in the Q1 made it a bit tough for slow comprehend-ers like me.

Is it GMAT standard timimg..... if one can finish the passage with correct answers in 6.5 - 7.5 mins...... or is that would be considered as a V-score damaging sign.

Thanks in appreciation
u1983
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workout VeritasKarishma GMATNinja MagooshExpert

Is not this correct text of passage I should be relating to for answering Q4:



instead of one mentioned by Skywalker18



What is proposal mentioned in Line -1 : promote the adoption of new agricultural technologies

Findings of the study:

Non-land wealth was also associated with more adoption of both technologies, but availability of uncultivated land reduced the incentive to employ the productivity-enhancing technologies.


Out because underlined portion is not mentioned in the argument.


I feel in to this trap answer, but is it incorrect because of italics?


Not mentioned in passage as result of study


I could not link this to OA.


Opposte of this is mentioned in passage, ie. Traditions of self-sufficiency and reliance on kinship ties tend to enhance local farmers’ receptivity to new agricultural technologies
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4) The findings of the study mentioned in the highlighted text, if valid for rain-forest regions in general, suggest that which of the following is an obstacle most likely to be faced by those wishing to promote rain-forest preservation by implementing the proposal mentioned in line 1?

A. Lack of legal property rights tends to discourage local farmers from investing the time and resources required to successfully implement new agricultural technologies.

B. The ability to evaluate the wider economic ramifications of adopting new aricultural technologies depends on a relatively high level of formal education.

C. Isolation from the market economy tends to restrict local farmers’ access to new agricultural technologies that could help them to increase their productivity.

D. Ready availability of uncultivated land tends to decrease local farmers’ incentive to adopt new agricultural technologies that would reduce their need to clear new land for cultivation.

E. Traditions of self-sufficiency and reliance on kinship ties tend to diminish local farmers’ receptivity to new agricultural technologies introduced by people from outside the local community.


This is what the first line says "One proposal for preserving rain forests is to promote the adoption of new agricultural technologies"
The proposal is to adopt new agricultural technologies.

This sentence "but availability of uncultivated land reduced the incentive to employ the productivity-enhancing technologies" connects to (D) perfectly. What confused you was perhaps this - "that would reduce their need to clear new land for cultivation"
This is just some info on new technologies which links to the first part of (D) - ready availability of land. Since land is readily available, new technologies (which help to reduce the need to clear new land) are not needed. When land is limited, these technologies would help since they would reduce the need for new land (if you can increase the productivity of current land using tech, you wouldn't need new land much). When land is available, these technologies would not be required.

A. Lack of legal property rights tends to discourage local farmers from investing the time and resources required to successfully implement new agricultural technologies.

"Household’s duration of residence in its village" was considered, not "legal property rights".

B. The ability to evaluate the wider economic ramifications of adopting new aricultural technologies depends on a relatively high level of formal education.

Rain-forest regions are relatively isolated, self-sufficient communities with ample land - not tied to a market economy. So economic ramifications are irrelevant.

C. Isolation from the market economy tends to restrict local farmers’ access to new agricultural technologies that could help them to increase their productivity.

Rain forest regions are usually economically isolated so this is not a factor that influences whether the farmers use new technologies.

E. Traditions of self-sufficiency and reliance on kinship ties tend to diminish local farmers’ receptivity to new agricultural technologies introduced by people from outside the local community.

Incorrect. Given that "longer residence (reliance on kinship) correlated with more adoption of improved plant varieties but less adoption of chemical herbicides."
So they are more receptive to some new tech and less receptive to other new tech.
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1. Primary purpose: present the results of new research suggesting that previous findings concerning one set of conditions may not be generalizable to another set of conditions
The passage begins with one of the proposal to preserve the rainforest based on a research. And then shows the gap in the research ( But these studies have focused on villages with limited land that are tied to a market economy rather than on the relatively isolated, self-sufficient communities with ample land characteristic of rain-forest regions). And then proceeds to provide a new research data presenting various reasons and facts on why old research conclusion is not applicable universally. Hence the option D is the clear winner.
2. Straightforward question: the only thing to look out is EXCEPT. clearly, the answer is C, because the passage speaks about the beneficiary usage of chemical herbicides and not against it.
3. The highlighted text "the study" states Tawahka people of the Honduran rain forest found that farmers with some formal education were more likely to adopt improved plant varieties. Hence the Assumption or missing link as per the passage states : in Tawahka society, kinship ties are a more important indicator ...., so researchers measured it by a household’s duration of residence in its village. They found that longer residence correlated with more adoption of improved plant varieties
Hence A
4. one of the reasons the old research could not be generalized is stated in the passage " But these studies have focused on villages with limited land that are tied to a market economy rather than on the relatively isolated, self-sufficient communities with ample land characteristic of rain-forest regions."
It gives us a clear understanding of a major obstacle in the implementation of the proposal. Hence D

The first few lines of this passage states that the proposal advocated increased use of chemical herbicides.

Hope it helps.

avvbh

E is wrong, because it is mentioned in the first sentence as a part of the proposal: "[...] and slow deforestation by reducing demand for new cropland." = "reduce their need to clear new land for cultivation"

D is wrong, because the proposal recommends to increase the use of chemical herbicides, not decrease it.