UPSC CIVIL SERVICES PRELIMINARY EXAMINATION

UPSC Prelims 2024— Question 95

2024General Studies Paper-IGeographyEconomic Geographymoderate
Q95

Question

Which of the following countries are well known as the two largest cocoa producers in the world?

Options

A
Algeria and Morocco
B
Botswana and Namibia
C
Cote D’Ivoire and Ghana✓ Correct Answer
D
Madagascar and Mozambique
AnswerOption C

Explanation

The correct answer is option (C). Côte d’Ivoire and Ghana are the two leading cocoa-producing countries globally and are especially dominant in world cocoa supply. The other pairs are not the two largest producers. The key to this question is to distinguish the exact constitutional provision, factual association, scientific principle, or current-affairs detail being tested from statements that are partly true but incomplete or incorrectly framed. UPSC often makes the distractors plausible by changing one institutional role, date, classification, geographic association, or causal relationship. Option A — “Algeria and Morocco” is incorrect. It does not match the established fact or contains the incorrect combination, institution, relationship, classification, or proposition identified in the explanation above. Choosing it would therefore introduce a factual error or omit a necessary element. Option B — “Botswana and Namibia” is incorrect. It does not match the established fact or contains the incorrect combination, institution, relationship, classification, or proposition identified in the explanation above. Choosing it would therefore introduce a factual error or omit a necessary element. Option C — “Cote D’Ivoire and Ghana” is correct. It matches the established fact described above and gives the complete combination or identification required by the question. Option D — “Madagascar and Mozambique” is incorrect. It does not match the established fact or contains the incorrect combination, institution, relationship, classification, or proposition identified in the explanation above. Choosing it would therefore introduce a factual error or omit a necessary element. For examination purposes, the safest approach is to verify each statement independently before looking at the answer-code combination. This is particularly important in statement-based questions, because one false clause makes an entire combination wrong. In factual questions, compare the defining characteristic asked in the stem with each alternative rather than relying on superficial familiarity. The answer recorded here follows the verified Set C key used for this database.

Question Classification

SubjectGeography
TopicEconomic Geography
SubtopicTerminal topic
Question TypeMulti-statement
Difficultymoderate
VerificationVerified