Question

Difficulty: Very hardInferential Comprehension and Deduction

Read the passage below carefully and evaluate the statement that follows.

For generations, the bi-annual Azalai camel caravans traversing the Ténéré desert to the salt pits of Bilma served as more than a transport route for salt slabs; they constituted a vital economic ecosystem for remote oasis settlements along the corridor. Oasis residents relied on trading livestock fodder, dates, and well water to thousands of camel drivers during their seasonal stopovers, providing these isolated communities with nearly all their annual liquidity. However, over the past two decades, the introduction of heavy diesel trucks has largely supplanted the traditional camel herds, compressing what was once a three-week journey into a three-day haul. While urban salt merchants in Niamey praise the trucks for drastically reducing spoilage and transit delays, rural oasis settlements have seen their local economies collapse. Bereft of the steady foot traffic and trade of the caravans, young oasis dwellers are increasingly forced to migrate to urban centers in search of wage labor.

Statement: The primary driver of rural-to-urban migration among youth in the Ténéré oasis settlements is the economic disruption caused by the shift in desert transport modes rather than changes in salt extraction methods.

Answer: Answer

Answer

True
The passage logically supports the statement: the replacement of camel caravans by trucks eliminated the intermediate stopover economy upon which oasis communities depended, forcing youth to seek urban wage labor. No change in salt extraction methods is stated or implied.

Step-by-Step Solution

1
Identify the factor responsible for the economic collapse in the oasis settlements from the text.
The text highlights that heavy diesel trucks replaced camel caravans, removing the seasonal stopovers and foot traffic that provided liquidity through fodder and water trading.
Pinpointing the root economic cause is essential for assessing the driver of demographic change.
2
Examine the connection between the economic collapse and youth migration.
The passage directly links the loss of caravan trade to young dwellers being forced to migrate to urban areas for wage labor.
This confirms that migration is a direct consequence of transport-induced commercial loss.
3
Assess whether salt extraction methods play a role in the passage's argument.
Salt extraction methods are not mentioned or implied as having changed; the focus is exclusively on salt transport.
Differentiating between transport changes and extraction techniques prevents making unwarranted inferences.

Key Concept

Inferential comprehension and distinguishing implicit causal relationships from unsupported assumptions.
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