Band 6.5 IELTS Writing Task 2 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 6.5 · IELTS Summit Mastery · 2026-08-25

IELTS Writing Task 2 question

Tourism is one of the fastest growing industries and contributes a great deal to economies around the world. However, the damage tourism can cause to local cultures and the environment is often ignored.

To what extent do you agree or disagree?

Give reasons for your answer and include any relevant examples from your own knowledge or experience.

Student answer (Band 6.5)

Tourism has become one of the backbones of many countries which contributes to the national income and strengthen the economy. In my opinion, although tourism participate in the nation building process, it has also created several environmental issues and impairments to the local cultures of these countries. Considering the advantages of tourism development, most of the countries are ignoring the consequences which would eventually lead to irrepairable situations.

Environmental degradation is the biggest drawback of extensive development of tourism. The uncontrolled flow of the tourists to the destinations has resulted in air,water and land pollution. The indequate facilities of the waste disposal has even worsened the condition in many countries. In fact, these governements have not paid attention to invest for the improvement of basic amenities, hence ended up in heavy environmental damages.

Another impact of uncontrolled tourism was the distruction of the local culture in these countries. The third world countries such as Nepal, Bhutan and India have witnessed a severe damage on their traditional cultures due to unrestricted tourism. The local people in these countries have even subjected to sex tourism. The recent report of a reputed tourism journalist revealed a shocking incident in which children under 18 have been continuously victimised by the tourists in a North-Eastern state of India. It is only the tip of the ice berg and sex assaults are very prevalent in many tourism destinations of third world countries.

In summary, The governments need to frame the policies to control the tourism promotion and form a regulatory mechanism to minimise the damages it creates. It is the need of the hour to promote responsible tourism and fortunately many countries have already started following the path.

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response — Band 6.5

The response addresses all parts of the prompt, clearly stating a position that tourism causes significant environmental and cultural damage. The ideas are relevant and supported with specific examples, such as the mention of Nepal, Bhutan, and India. However, the development of these ideas is somewhat uneven. While the environmental impact is discussed, the argument regarding cultural damage focuses heavily on a specific, extreme issue (sex tourism) rather than a broader analysis of cultural erosion. To reach a higher band, you should aim to balance your supporting points more evenly and ensure that the depth of analysis is consistent across all body paragraphs.

Coherence and Cohesion — Band 7.0

The essay is logically organized with a clear introduction, two body paragraphs, and a conclusion. Each paragraph has a central topic sentence, which helps the reader follow your argument. You use some cohesive devices, such as 'In fact,' 'Another impact,' and 'In summary,' to link ideas. However, the flow between sentences is occasionally mechanical, and some transitions could be more sophisticated. For instance, the transition between the environmental impact and the cultural impact is functional but could be smoother. Overall, the paragraphing is appropriate and the progression of ideas is clear throughout the text.

Lexical Resource — Band 6.0

You demonstrate an adequate range of vocabulary for the task, including terms like 'irreparable,' 'degradation,' and 'regulatory mechanism.' There are some instances of slightly awkward word choice or collocation, such as 'participate in the nation building process' (should be 'contributes to') and 'subjected to sex tourism' (should be 'have been subjected to'). Additionally, there are minor spelling errors like 'governements' and 'distruction.' While these errors do not impede communication, they prevent the essay from reaching a higher band. Focusing on more precise collocations and proofreading for spelling will help improve your score in this area.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy — Band 6.0

The essay uses a mix of simple and complex sentence structures. There are several grammatical errors, such as subject-verb agreement issues ('tourism participate' instead of 'participates') and article usage ('the uncontrolled flow of the tourists'). Some sentences are slightly clunky, such as 'these governements have not paid attention to invest for the improvement,' which would be better phrased as 'these governments have not invested enough in the improvement.' While the meaning is always clear, the frequency of these minor errors indicates that you have not yet achieved the level of control required for a higher band score.

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