Plastic bags, plastic bottles and plastic packaging are bad for the environment. What damage does plastic do to the environment? What can be done by governments and individuals to solve this problem?
Sample Response
Plastic is used extensively because it is cheap and convenient, but it has severe environmental impacts. Plastic is not biodegradable, and the damage caused to the environment, especially to farmlands, oceans and marine life due to our love for plastic, is profound and should be stopped immediately. In this essay, I will outline the harms plastic causes to the environment and explore what could be done by governments and individuals to solve this problem.
The damagedamages that plastic causes to the planetthe mother planet are significant and irreversible. Plastic bags, cutlerycutleries, bottles, and packaging are not biodegradable, and they take thousands of years to decompose. This means that once we discard plastic-made goods, they will remain in the environment for an extremely long timean extensive amount of time. Plastic waste severely degradesIt severely degrades the fertility of farmlandfarming lands all around the world. Moreover, plastic that finds its way into the bodies of water, including oceansbody of water or oceans can be particularly harmful, as it can entangle and suffocate animals living there. Plastic that reaches the waterPlastic, that reaches the water, can also be ingested by marine animalsanimals and fishes there, causing injury or death to these species. According to the Natural Environment data, approximately a hundred thousand sea turtles and other marine animals die each year because they get entangled in plastic items.
To solve the problems caused by plasticplastics, authorities and individuals need to take immediate action. First, governments all around the world cangovernments, all around the world, can impose strict environmental laws, such as banning the use of plastic bags and promoting the use of biodegradable and renewable resources without delay. They can also impose hefty taxes on plastic products to discourage their use and manufacturemanufacturing. Additionally, governments can organize numerous environmental awareness campaigns and programmes to educate the general public about the dangers of plastic and the benefits of using biodegradable and renewable alternatives.
The general public can also make a difference by reducing their use of plastic bags, bottles, and packaging, whichpackaging which will have a huge positive impact onin curbing the detrimental effects of plasticplastics. They can do this by using reusable bags made of jute or clothclothes, glass bottles and containers, and by choosing to use products that require almost no packaginghave almost no packaging requirements. Additionally, individualsmass people can support businesses that use sustainable packaging, which can help keep millions of tons of plastic materials out of landfills every year.
In conclusion, without a doubt, plastic is bad for the environment as it causes significant damage to our mother planet. We need to act now to stop the spread of plastic towards making a world free of plastic contamination and help the planet, especially the ocean, retain its biodiversity.
Why this response received Band 7.5
The response fully addresses environmental damage and offers clearly separated, well-developed actions for governments and individuals, with strong progression throughout. Its main limitation is imprecise or unnatural wording in otherwise wide-ranging language, including several awkward collocations and plural forms. The highest-priority improvement is to refine lexical precision and grammatical control so the detailed ideas are expressed more naturally and concisely.
IELTS Writing Criteria Scores
Task Response
Both parts of the task are fully addressed through developed environmental impacts and practical measures for governments and individuals.
Strengthen the response further by qualifying broad claims and ensuring supporting examples are clearly credible and necessary.
Coherence and Cohesion
The essay is clearly organised into damage, government action, and individual action, with well-managed progression throughout.
Reduce minor repetition between the introduction and conclusion to make the overall progression more concise.
Lexical Resource
The response uses a broad topic-specific range, but several unnatural collocations and word forms reduce lexical precision.
Use more idiomatic alternatives for phrases such as 'mother planet,' 'mass people,' and 'plastic contamination.'
Grammatical Range and Accuracy
A wide variety of complex sentences is generally controlled, though punctuation, agreement, article, and number errors remain noticeable.
Review relative clauses, plural forms, and comma placement so complex sentences remain accurate as well as varied.
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IELTS Writing Task 2
Plastic bags, plastic bottles and plastic packaging are bad for the environment. What damage does plastic do to the environment? What can be done by governments and individuals to solve this problem?
Your response
Write the task yourself, then compare your choices with the annotated response.