Self-study
P1
The 50 million sheep of New Zealand outnumber its people 13 to 1, the highest such ratio in the world. ██ ███ ████ ██████████ █████ ██ ███ ██████ ███ ████ ███████ ██ ███ ███████ █████████ ████ ████ █ █████ ██ ████ █████████ █████ ██████ █████████ ███
Intro to Topic ·
New Zealand wool industry
Golden age in the 1950s.
Problem ·
Decline in wool production and profitability
Details of Problem ·
Competition from synthetics
Downward pressure on prices of "strong wool."
P2
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Solution ·
Improve productivity to improve profitability
Productivity can be improved by adopting the best management and breeding practices.
P3
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Solution ·
Better farm management
Status Quo ·
Producers are divided
Professional farms achieve high profitability. Family farms do not. Hooking this back to the previous paragraph, presumably the idea is that the family farms can learn management practices from the professionals.
P4
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Solution ·
Establish commercial genetic research company
Not to increase wool processing efficiency. Instead, to focus on producing better quality wool more cheaply.
Passage Style
Problem-analysis
Single position
1.
Which one of the following ████ ██████████ █████████ ███ ████ █████ ██ ███ ████████
a
New Zealand wool ███████ ██████ ██ ██████████ ██ █████ ██ █████ ████████████ ███████ ██ ████████ ██████████████
The author doesn’t advocate for shifting to other agricultural exports. The author advocates for better farm management and genetic research to identify super-sheep.
b
Wool growing in ███ ███████ █████████ ████████████ █████████ █████████ ██ ████ ██ ██ ████████ ██████ ███████ ███████ █████ ████████████ ██████████ ███ ███████ ██████ ██████
Although (B) is supported by the passage, this doesn’t capture the author’s advocacy for better farm management and genetic research.
c
New Zealand's wool ████████ ███ ████ █████████ ████████ ██ ███ ███████████ ███ ███████████ ██ ███████████
Although (C) is supported by the passage, this doesn’t capture the author’s advocacy for better farm management and genetic research.
d
Superior farm management ██████ ██ ██████████ █████ ███ █████████ ████ ███████ ██ ██████████ ███ █████████ ████ █████████
This is the best answer. It seems to leave out the “genetic research” component of the author’s recommendation, but there’s no other answer that captures at least some of the author’s solution for the problem of declining wool production.
e
The wool industry ██ ███ ███████ ███ ███ ███ ████ █████ ██ ██████████ ███ ██████████ ██ ██████████ ███ ███ ██████ ██ ███████ ███ █████ ██ █████████ ████████ ███████
This doesn’t capture the author’s advocacy of a solution to declining wool production. The main point isn’t merely a claim about the problem; it’s to advocate a solution for that problem.