The bar chart below shows the percentage of government spending on roads and transport in four countries from 1990 to 2005.
Sample Response
The bar chart compares the proportion of national government expenditure allocated to roads and transportroad and transport infrastructure in four countries—ItalyItalia, Portugal, the UK, and the USA—with data presented for four separate years between 1990 and 2005.
Overall, government spending in this sector showed an overall declinedemonstrated a downward trend in three of the four nations. It is also clear that the percentages for Italia and Portugal were consistently higher than those for the UK and the USA throughout the entire period.
In 1990, Portugal allocated the largest proportionallocated the highest percentage, at approximately 27% of its government budget, to roads and transport. Italia was second, with its spending at around 22%. In stark contrast, the USA and the UK spent significantly less, at roughly 11% and 10% respectively, with both figures low and similarmaking their figures the lowest and quite similar.
Over the following 15 years, Portugal's proportion of expenditurePortugal's leading expenditure decreased significantly, finishing at 20% in 2005. Italia's spending fluctuated, peaking at about 23%about 23.5% in 2000, but ultimately decreased overallultimately saw an overall decrease to 19%. The UK's figure also fluctuated mildly but ended lower, falling from 10% to 8%. The USA was the only exception; after an initial dip to 10% in 1995, its spending subsequently rose, finishing at 15% in 2005.
Why this response received Band 8.0
This is a focused and highly accurate report with a clear overview, well-selected comparisons, and confident control of complex sentences. The main limitation is occasional slightly unnatural wording, particularly the phrasing around Portugal’s expenditure, while some intermediate values are summarised rather than explicitly reported. The best refinement would be to keep the concise selection of data while choosing consistently natural collocations for expenditure and change.
IELTS Writing Criteria Scores
Task Achievement
The response accurately identifies the main trends and country groupings, supporting them with well-chosen start, peak, and end figures from the chart.
Add one or two carefully selected intermediate-year figures where they would make the fluctuations even more explicit.
Coherence and Cohesion
The overview and two detail paragraphs form a clear progression, and cohesive devices guide the comparisons without becoming intrusive.
Maintain this structure while making each detail paragraph’s organising principle explicit from its opening sentence.
Lexical Resource
Vocabulary is varied and precise for proportions, expenditure, fluctuation, and contrast, with only an occasional less natural combination such as leading expenditure.
Prefer established collocations such as Portugal’s proportion or Portugal’s allocation when referring to the highest figure.
Grammatical Range and Accuracy
Complex and simple structures are used flexibly and accurately throughout, with punctuation and agreement consistently controlled.
Preserve this control while varying a few sentence openings to make the already fluent description even more polished.
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IELTS Academic Writing Task 1
The bar chart below shows the percentage of government spending on roads and transport in four countries from 1990 to 2005.
Your response
Write the task yourself, then compare your choices with the annotated response.