With reference to the above passage, the following assumptions have been made:
- 1.Diversification of livelihoods acts as a coping strategy for climate change.
- 2.Adoption of monocropping practice leads to the extinction of plant varieties and their wild relatives.
Which of the above assumptions is/are valid?
Answer & explanation
Answer: (c) Both 1 and 2
UPSC's official answer: (c) · the answer UPSC accepted, and the one that counts in the exam
Also defensible: (b)
- Assumption 2 is clearly made. Crop choice 'favours homogeneity', and 'accelerated breeding programmes are needed to conserve a wider pool of genetic resources of existing crops, breeds, and their wild relatives'. One conserves what is being lost, so the author assumes that uniform cropping is losing varieties and their wild relatives.
- Assumption 1 speaks of 'diversification of livelihoods'. The passage says 'a diversity of natural assets will be needed to cope with climate change and ensure productive agriculture, forestry, and fisheries': the diversity it wants is of natural assets (crop varieties, ecosystems, corridors), and livelihoods are never mentioned.
- UPSC's key reads 'agriculture, forestry, and fisheries' as diversified livelihoods and accepts 1, giving (c); on the passage's own words only 2 is assumed, giving (b).
UPSC's key accepts both assumptions; a stricter reading of 'diversity of natural assets' accepts only 2, giving (b). In the exam, when a passage's central idea is 'diversity helps us cope', UPSC accepts a broadly worded restatement of it as a valid assumption, so pick 'both' unless a statement contradicts the passage.
This box is Minimalist IAS's analysis, with its sources; it does not change UPSC's answer.
UPSC's key accepts both assumptions. The passage opens by making diversity the way to cope with climate change and keep agriculture, forestry and fisheries productive, the livelihoods that rest on natural assets; and it urges conservation of a wider gene pool because crop choice is drifting towards homogeneity, which assumes that uniform cropping is losing varieties and their wild relatives.
- ✓ 1. The opening sentence ties a 'diversity of natural assets' to coping with climate change and to productive 'agriculture, forestry, and fisheries'. Read for its underlying belief, the author assumes that spreading the basis of livelihoods across diverse assets and sectors is how people cope with a changing climate.
- ✓ 2. Crop choice 'favours homogeneity', and breeding programmes are 'needed to conserve a wider pool of genetic resources of existing crops, breeds, and their wild relatives'. One conserves what is being lost: the author assumes that uniform (mono) cropping is driving varieties and their wild relatives towards extinction.
Remember · An assumption is the unstated belief behind a recommendation: urging conservation of a gene pool assumes current practice is depleting it, and calling diversity the answer to climate change assumes that diversification is a coping strategy.
Question and answer: UPSC's official GS Paper II (2018, Series A) — paper ↗ · answer key ↗. Explanation: Minimalist IAS, checked 1 Oct 2026 (how we verify). ·