Nups1324 wrote:
GMATNinja VeritasKarishma AndrewN generis AjiteshArun MartyTargetTestPrep EMPOWERgmatRichC egmatDear experts,
It'll be really helpful if you could give us a detailed explanation.
Thank you
Posted from my mobile device I would be happy to oblige,
Nups1324; this is a rather terse OE. If a certain construct is unclear, it can help sometimes to focus on just the essential parts of the sentence. Here, we get something like the following:
The oranges are shipped out fresh... exported to A, B, C, and D, where people love citrus.I think the component
the vast majority, missing from my chopped-and-channeled sentence above, may be confusing a number of people. We will address this more below.
Bunuel wrote:
The remaining Florida oranges are shipped out fresh, the vast majority exported to Canada, Europe, China, and, increasingly, Singapore, where people love premium citrus.
A. fresh, the vast majority exported to Canada, Europe, China, and, increasingly, Singapore, where
Remove
the vast majority, and you have a straightforward -ed modifier:
oranges are shipped out fresh... exported to Canada... The main clause tells us that something is sent, and the modifier tells us where. No problem. There is also no issue with listing the destinations in
to A, B, C, and D form, rather than repeating
to each time. Then, since
increasingly is self-contained within double commas in this answer choice and every other, we can safely skip over it in the sentence and focus on the final element. Does it make sense to say that
the vast majority of oranges [are] exported to Singapore, where people love premium citrus? Sure. Singapore is a place or location, so
where is fitting. In short, I can find nothing to argue against in this answer choice. But unless I had 10 seconds on the clock, I would check the other answers to feel better about committing to this one.
Bunuel wrote:
B. fresh, the vast majority is exported to Canada, Europe, China, and, increasingly, Singapore, a place where
There are a couple issues with this one. If the comma were a semicolon instead, then adding a verb to what is a modifier in the original sentence would not be a problem: a semicolon is used to join two independent clauses. But with a comma, that same
is overloads the sentence and creates what is known as a comma splice, an instance in which two independent clauses are joined by nothing more than a comma (i.e. without a conjunction). I know that the GMAT™ is not typically a straight-up test of grammar, but at the same time, it is not going to let a sentence with a comma splice beat out a more grammatical option. Then,
is is not even the right conjugation of
to be that we need here. It is
the vast majority of
oranges that
are exported to certain locations, not
is. We are counting individual fruits. At the tail-end of the underlined portion, what does
a place where achieve in the way of clarity that
where does not convey on its own? With all these considerations in mind, we can safely call this answer suboptimal next to (A) and eliminate it.
Bunuel wrote:
C. fresh and the vast majority are exported to Canada, Europe, China, and, increasingly, to Singapore, whose
The head of this suggested replacement is missing a comma between two independent clauses, so once again, the grammar is shaky. Add to this an extraneous
to before the final country in the list, and we have a parallelism issue. For the extra
to to work, we would need to wrap up the first list at
China, as in,
exported to Canada, Europe, and China, and, increasingly, to Singapore. Finally, although
whose differs from the majority of the other answer choices, it is not incorrect to mention the name of a country and then refer to its population using the possessive pronoun, making the split a red herring. Taken as a whole, this answer choice is just as flawed as (B) was above.
Bunuel wrote:
D. fresh and the vast majority is exported to Canada, Europe, China, and, increasingly, to Singapore, where
There is nothing new that this answer choice presents that we have not seen already. The same comma we needed before is absent again, the same
is is used in reference to
the majority of oranges, and the same
to is just as superfluous at the end.
Bunuel wrote:
E. fresh and the vast majority is exported to Canada, Europe, China, and, increasingly, to Singapore, whose
Once again, all of the issues here have already been discussed above. For those who may have considered (E), do you think that with all the other potential discussion points on display, GMAC™ would take a
where/whose split and make
that the crucial decision factor? I think not. If anything, (D) and (E) can be used to cast doubt on each other.
With that said, choice (A) is a clear winner. When you can find nothing to argue against in an answer choice, then that is the one you need to choose. I hope that helps. Good luck with your studies.
- Andrew