Many manufactured food and drink products contain high levels of sugar, which causes many health problems. So, sugary products should be made more expensive to encourage people to consume less sugar. Do you agree or disagree?
Sample Response
Sugary foods and drinks are detrimental to health, so many suggest increasing their price to dissuade many people from purchasing and intaking them. But, I will have to disagree with this opinion. This essay explains the reasons behind my opinion.
To begin with, even if the authority suddenly increases the prices of all sugary products, we will still notice that many people are still buying those products as usual. They will be buying them either because they are just too much “addicted” to those sugary products, or a high price does not really curtail their abilities to buy such expensive products. It will, however, negatively affect the prices of the necessary food items, and poor people will suffer to a great extent because it is not only “sugar” that is needed to make sugary products, but rather several other raw materials, such as flour, milk, egg, oil and etc. And that means that if the governments want to increase the price of sugary products, they will not only have to impose a higher tax exclusively on sugar but also on other raw materials.
Another problem with taking such a decision is that some manufacturers of these sugary products would still try to sell them illegally to their existing customers at a lower price, through some “back channels” or secretly, in order to keep their businesses, because a higher price of their products would almost inevitably push many of their regular customers away from buying their products.
A far better solution to this problem would be to make people aware of the consequences of eating and drinking sugary items. When mass people are aware of the issues, they will spontaneously reject sugary items without creating any pressure on the market.
In conclusion, we need to run awareness campaigns to inform people about the negative aspects of eating and drinking sugary items. When they are made aware, it will bring positive results while price hikes on sugary items would make things only worse.
IELTS Writing Correction
- 1. Match plural products Original: price Suggested revision: prices Why it matters: The plural foods and drinks have plural prices.
- 2. Use correct consumption verb Original: intaking Suggested revision: consuming Why it matters: “Intake” is normally a noun, while “consume” is the natural verb here.
- 3. Use formal contrast Original: But, I will have to disagree Suggested revision: However, I disagree Why it matters: The revision removes the unnecessary comma after “But” and states the contrast directly.
- 4. Fix reason collocation Original: behind Suggested revision: for Why it matters: The natural expression is “reasons for” an opinion.
- 5. Clarify decision-maker Original: the authority suddenly increases Suggested revision: the government increases Why it matters: “The government” identifies the responsible body, while “suddenly” adds no useful meaning.
- 6. Remove repeated still Original: we will still notice that many people are still buying Suggested revision: many people will continue buying Why it matters: The revision removes an unnecessary observer and the duplicated word “still.”
- 7. Use concise link Original: And that means that Suggested revision: This means that Why it matters: The revision links the consequence directly without the conversational opening “And.”
- 8. Use general plural Original: the governments want Suggested revision: governments want Why it matters: A general plural reference does not take the definite article.
- 9. Use awareness collocation Original: make people aware of the consequences Suggested revision: raise people's awareness of the consequences Why it matters: “Raise awareness of” is the standard formal collocation.
- 10. Use correct collective noun Original: mass people Suggested revision: the general public Why it matters: “Mass people” is not a standard English noun phrase.
- 11. Specify the issues Original: aware of the issues Suggested revision: aware of the health risks Why it matters: The revision identifies the relevant consequences instead of using the vague noun “issues.”
- 12. Describe voluntary avoidance Original: spontaneously reject sugary items Suggested revision: voluntarily avoid sugary items Why it matters: Consumers avoid products rather than “spontaneously reject” them in this context.
Suggested Rewrites
- price prices
- intaking consuming
- But, I will have to disagree However, I disagree
- behind for
- the authority suddenly increases the government increases
- we will still notice that many people are still buying many people will continue buying
Why this response received Band 6.5
The response maintains a clear disagreement and is organised effectively around reasons why higher prices may fail, followed by an alternative solution. The main weakness is that some supporting claims, especially about taxing raw materials and illegal sales, are speculative or logically underdeveloped. The highest-priority improvement is to use more convincing causal reasoning and precise examples while correcting recurring unnatural word choices.
IELTS Writing Criteria Scores
Task Response
The position is clear throughout and the response develops several relevant arguments, though some reasoning is questionable or not fully substantiated.
Strengthen each argument with a plausible, specific explanation of how higher prices would affect consumption and different income groups.
Coherence and Cohesion
The essay is clearly paragraphed and progresses logically from objections to an alternative and conclusion, with generally effective cohesive devices.
Make the relationship between the first paragraph's pricing claims more explicit and avoid repetitive references to sugary products.
Lexical Resource
There is sufficient range to discuss taxation, consumer behaviour, and public awareness, but several unnatural choices and collocations reduce precision.
Replace awkward expressions such as purchasing and intaking, mass people, and abilities to buy with natural academic phrasing.
Grammatical Range and Accuracy
The response uses a variety of complex sentences with generally clear meaning, although article, agreement, punctuation, and phrasing errors recur.
Improve control by shortening overloaded sentences and checking articles, plural forms, and clause punctuation during proofreading.
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IELTS Writing Task 2
Many manufactured food and drink products contain high levels of sugar, which causes many health problems. So, sugary products should be made more expensive to encourage people to consume less sugar. Do you agree or disagree?
Your response
Write the task yourself, then compare your choices with the annotated response.