“what-clause‘’

@Sarah Zhou posted:

“The Three Million African Genomes (3MAG) project, a continent-wide endeavour, proposes to do for the place what has already been done for Europe, North America and parts of Asia—namely to catalogue and analyse the genetic diversity of those who live there.”[from The Economist]

The main sentence is “The Three Million African Genomes (3MAG) project proposes to catalogue and analyse the genetic diversity of those who live there.”

I think “what-clause” below is modifying “TheThree Million African Genomes (3MAG) project”. But why it follows the word “place”

Hi, Sarah—No, the "what"-clause does not modify that phrase. It does not modify anything. The "what"-clause is a noun phrase that functions as the direct object of "do": The project proposes to do something for the place  "something" = "what has already been done for Europe, North America . . .").