Question

Soda ash (sodium carbonate) is made in two ways: from natural trona ore (natural soda ash), and from common salt by the Solvay process (synthetic soda ash). Tata Chemicals is one of the world's largest soda ash producers.

Two charts give the data. The first chart plots WORLD production of natural and synthetic soda ash for the years 2001 to 2006: the synthetic soda ash bars climb every year over this period, while the natural soda ash bars stay roughly flat. The second chart plots Tata Chemicals' own natural and synthetic output:

Year	Natural Soda Ash (MT)	Synthetic Soda Ash (MT)
2005	0	0.7
2007	0.4	2.2
2008	3.2	2.2

Which of the following statements are true?
1. Proportion of natural soda ash to synthetic soda ash has decreased from 2001 to 2006 globally.
2. Proportion of natural soda ash to synthetic soda ash has increased from 2001 to 2006 globally.
3. Proportion of synthetic soda ash to total soda ash has decreased for Tata Chemicals from 2005 to 2007.
4. Proportion of synthetic soda ash to total ash has increased for Tata Chemicals.

• A. 1 and 3
• B. 1 and 4
• C. 2 and 4
• D. 2 and 3

Hint:

Look at which bar is climbing and which is flat in each chart: a ratio falls whenever its denominator grows faster than its numerator.

Answer 1

The Correct Option is A

Step 1: Understanding the Question:
We must check four statements: two compare the world's natural to synthetic soda ash ratio from 2001 to 2006, and two compare Tata Chemicals' own synthetic share of its total output between 2005 and 2007.

Step 2: Key Formula or Approach:
A ratio rises only when its numerator grows faster than its denominator. So for each pair of statements, we track which bar in the chart is climbing and which one is flat.

Step 3: Detailed Explanation:
In the world chart, synthetic soda ash output climbs every year from 2001 to 2006, while natural soda ash output stays roughly flat over the same years.
Since the denominator here (synthetic) keeps growing while the numerator (natural) barely moves, the ratio of natural to synthetic falls every year.
So statement 1 (the world ratio decreased) is correct, and statement 2 (it increased) is wrong.
Now look at Tata Chemicals. In 2005, Tata made 0 MT of natural soda ash, so its entire output of 0.7 MT was synthetic. That means synthetic's share of Tata's total was 0.7 divided by 0.7, which is 100 percent.
By 2007, Tata had started making natural soda ash too (0.4 MT), so its output was 0.4 MT natural plus 2.2 MT synthetic, giving a synthetic share of 2.2 divided by 2.6, which is about 85 percent.
Since 85 percent is lower than 100 percent, Tata's synthetic share fell from 2005 to 2007. This confirms statement 3 is correct.
Carrying the same trend to 2008 (3.2 MT natural, 2.2 MT synthetic), the synthetic share falls further to 2.2 divided by 5.4, which is about 41 percent. Since the share kept falling rather than rising, statement 4 (it increased) is wrong.

Step 4: Final Answer:
Only statements 1 and 3 hold up, so the answer is option A.
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