The pie chart below shows the main reasons why agricultural land becomes less productive. The table shows how these causes affected three regions of the world during the 1990s.
Sample Response
The pie chart and table show reasons for worldwide land degradation and& causes of land degradation in three different regionsin three different regions respectively in the 1990s. The main cause of land degradation worldwide was over-grazing which caused 35% land degradation, while the highest percentage of land degradation in different regions was due to over-grazing and in Oceania, this was the highest. The chart shows thatIt can be examined that the second largest factor of land degradation was deforestation which was 5 percentage points lower thandifferentiates by 5% less than over-grazing. Then the third-largest causethird driven-reason of land degradation was over-cultivation accounting for 28% of land degradationwith 28% effect on land degradation. These three main reasons caused 93% of total land degradation93% total degradation of lands and the remaining 7%and remaining 7% was due to other causesreasons. The area where highest land degraded occurred was in Europe which was 23%. Oceania (whichthat included Australia and New Zealand and a large part of the South Pacifica large part of South Pacific) ranked as the region with the second-highest proportion of degraded landsecond highest land-degraded area at just over half of Europe's land-degradation percentageby only around a half of European land degradation percentage. North America was the regionis the area with the lowest proportion of land degradationthe least land degradation, especially with the least deforestationwith least deforestation. Deforestation and over-cultivation contributed to European land degradation more than other parts as they were the highest level of degradation in each region.
Why this response received Band 6.5
The response identifies the principal global causes and correctly ranks Europe, Oceania, and North America by total degradation, giving it a sound factual core. However, the regional table is described too generally and one claim implies that over-grazing dominates across the regions, while frequent awkward constructions reduce clarity; prioritise exact cause-by-region comparisons in a more clearly structured report.
IELTS Writing Criteria Scores
Task Achievement
The main global proportions and regional totals are mostly accurate, but the overview is dispersed and the region-specific causes receive limited numerical comparison.
State clearly that Europe had the highest total degradation, then compare the dominant cause in each region using figures such as 9.8%, 3.3%, and 11.3%.
Coherence and Cohesion
The report moves from the pie chart to regional totals in a broadly logical sequence, though the single paragraph and some overloaded sentences weaken progression.
Organise the response into an overview followed by separate detail paragraphs for global causes and regional patterns.
Lexical Resource
Relevant vocabulary is used throughout, but frequent unnatural combinations such as third driven-reason and highest land degraded reduce lexical precision.
Use established reporting phrases such as third-largest cause, proportion of land degraded, and the region with the highest degradation.
Grammatical Range and Accuracy
Complex structures are attempted and meaning remains generally clear, but article omissions, malformed superlatives, agreement problems, and awkward clause construction occur frequently.
Build comparisons with controlled patterns such as Europe recorded the highest total, while North America had the lowest, and proofread each clause for articles and verb forms.
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IELTS Academic Writing Task 1
The pie chart below shows the main reasons why agricultural land becomes less productive. The table shows how these causes affected three regions of the world during the 1990s.
Your response
Write the task yourself, then compare your choices with the annotated response.