IELTS Writing Task 2 - Environment and Economy in the success

I've just finished my essay on environment and economy. Its topic is: "Some people say that it is possible for a country to be both economically successful and have a clean environment. Other disagree. Discuss both view and give your opinion".

Please kindly help me to point out its mistakes and what can be improved, for example the grammar, sentence structure, collocations or idioms. Which score can I get with this essay? Your comments are highly appreciated. Thank you.

critical pillars of sustainable development strategy

These days, environment and economy are 2 out of 3 critical pillars in each country's sustainable development strategy. However, a tough challenge that every government faces is how to remain the economy growth rate along with keeping the environment well-preserved. Some people believe that there is a chance for the coexistence of economic success and environment protection, but did not some others. Therefore, it is worthwhile to investigate the possibility of these two claims.

For the supporters of the idea of economic development and environment preservation harmony, they strongly believe this claim for some reasons. First of all, myriad countries have been made aware of the importance of the environment and witnessed the detrimental effects of environmental degradation, so environment protection are being given priority in national policy-making process.. Countries are struggling to build up more environment-friendly economies based on clean technololgy such as ecological tourism, renewable energy , green transportation or electric motors. Secondly, many nations have been in effort to cut down on emissions and promoted clean-energy consumption. They must adhere to commitments stated in international treaties on curbing climate change in which party nations are obligated to reduce greenhouse emissions. Last but not least, with the scientific and technological advancement, knowledge-based economy have become dominant to replace the traditional-manufacturing economy. This means that the economy aim to be more eco-friendly rather than damaging it

Those who condemn the combination of economic development and environment protection are based on the fact that nowadays, human economic activities have serious harmful impacts on the environment. For example, industries are still considerably relied on fossil fuel energy, which is the main cause of air pollution. In agriculture, the overuse of chemical fertilizers, weedkillers or pesticides leads to the contamination of land and water resources. For impoverished countries, they are not affordable to apply new technology since it requires money in huge amount and highly-qualified workforce. Moreover, tightened regulations on environment protection might hamper the business of corporations, so many jurisdictions introduce lenient rules on this issue to attract more foreign investments.

Although it takes years to build up an global environment-friendly economy, international community is involved in a common struggle to achieve this goal day by day. I strongly believe that many countries have been successful in economic growth and environment preservation and they are helping other ones to approach it. With commitments and struggles, any country can get it done.

Duc, I will not give you a score for this essay because you did not accurately follow the prompt instructions. You have to remember, the IELTS test is designed to test your ability to ready, understand, and follow a given set of instructions for the discussion of a particular topic. In this essay, the main requirement for the discussion was to discuss both sides and give your opinion within the body of paragraphs. You neglected to present your personal opinion after a discussion of the two sides. Therefore, the essay did not follow the prompt requirements and will receive a low score. I would not say it would fail in totality, but , with the TA score being considered, there is no way that the essay will pass that first criteria. As such, the rest of the scores to be given will also be low.

In terms of content, your paragraphs are held back from properly developing the discussions and complex sentences because you are trying to discuss too many reasons all at once. What you have to do is just pick one reason, the strongest one that you can defend, then fully develop that paragraph. Pay particular attention to your tense usage. For example there is an error in :


The correct statement would be:

... industries are still considerably reliant on...

Reliant is the present tense form of the word relied. You need to brush up on your skills in that section of English usage.

Then, there is the problem of your misuse of certain English terms that will lower your LR score:


The proper presentation is:

... how to sustain the economic ...

Of course, there is still the lack of personal opinion in the essay that needs to be addressed. Without it, the essay is incomplete and does not follow the prompt requirements. This makes it obvious that you have not discussed the essay in the required format. Therefore, the essay may not get a passing score in the end. If you honestly want a score, I think it will most likely be a 4.

Hello Đức,

You could write 250-300 words for task 2, but your essay is 407 words.

Your paragraphs do not follow the prompt: The first para, you said For the supporters of the idea of economic development and environment preservation harmony but you didn't write details about bad effects, You just discussed solution.....

In the second para, you said Those who condemn the combination of economic development and environment protection
. But most of your para gave example about the reason of bad effects, why governments can't start this idea?.

I hope it can help you,

Minh Phuc

Hi Duc, I have comments for your introduction part:

You started by stating a knowledge which is not common to the public: "2 out of 3 critical pillars". It would be better if this sentence mentioned some general ideas. Or you might need to revise this to be something like"Together with society, environment and economy are 2 out of 3 critical pillars..."

I also suggest that your second sentence should be edited: "Some people believe that there is a chance for the coexistence of economic success and environment protection, but others disagree."

Thank you all for having taken your time to provide me with your helpful corrections. Your comments are much appreciated. Looking forward to receiving your help with my coming essays.