Should Home-Grown Food Labels Be Legally Promoted?
A complete IELTS Academic Writing Task 2 question with a model answer of 295 words, plus a breakdown of the sentence structures, cohesive devices and vocabulary that answer uses. Write your own version first, then compare.
Written by Manish Sharma · CELTA and DELTA qualified · 8 years teaching IELTS
Score my answer to this questionThe question
You have 40 minutes. Write at least 250 words.
Some people argue that governments should pass laws requiring supermarkets and producers to clearly promote home-grown food labels, in order to support local farmers and reduce environmental impact. To what extent do you agree or disagree? Give reasons for your answer and include any relevant examples from your own knowledge or experience. Write at least 250 words.
How to approach it
- 01Take a clear position in the introduction and stick to it
- 02Distinguish between labelling transparency and forced promotion — they are different
- 03Use real-country examples (France, South Korea) for credibility
- 04Acknowledge counter-arguments to strengthen, not weaken, your view
- 05Use hedging language: 'largely agree', 'stop short of', 'in my view'
- 06Make sure your conclusion sharpens your position, not just repeats it
Model answer
295 words in 5 paragraphs. Read it after you have written your own, not before: the point of a model answer is to show you what you missed, and you cannot miss anything you have not attempted.
Calls for stronger labelling of home-grown food are increasingly common in countries that depend heavily on agricultural imports. While I largely agree that governments should require clearer "country of origin" promotion in supermarkets, I would stop short of legally mandating preferential displays, as this can distort markets and disadvantage consumers.
There are persuasive reasons to support stronger labelling rules. Local farmers often compete against imports produced under cheaper labour conditions or lower environmental standards, and a transparent label allows consumers to make an informed choice rather than relying on packaging design alone. The carbon footprint argument is also significant: a strawberry flown from another continent in winter can carry far higher emissions than one grown locally in season. Countries such as France and South Korea already require prominent origin labelling for fresh produce, and surveys suggest that this has measurably increased domestic purchasing without raising prices.
However, going further and legally privileging home-grown labels — for example by mandating that they occupy the most visible shelf space — risks several unintended consequences. Such rules can amount to disguised protectionism, inviting retaliation from trading partners, and may raise the price of out-of-season fruit and vegetables for low-income households. They can also penalise smaller importers and ethnic food retailers, whose customers rely on items that simply cannot be grown domestically.
In my view, the right balance lies in mandating clear, standardised origin labels and funding consumer-education campaigns, while leaving purchasing decisions to shoppers themselves. Governments can additionally support local producers through direct grants and sustainable farming subsidies rather than by skewing supermarket displays.
In conclusion, I agree that transparency about food origin should be legally required, but I disagree with using the law to engineer preference, since transparent information serves both farmers and consumers more fairly than mandated promotion.
What this answer actually does
Measured from the text above, and compared against the other 69 answers of the same type in this library. These are counts, not band scores: they describe what the writing does, which is the part you can copy.
4 more than the median answer for this task type
9 words at the shortest, 36 at the longest
2 more than the median answer for this task type
carry a subordinate or relative clause
Sentence rhythm
Sentences average 24.6 words and vary by 7.1 words either side of that, running from 9 words to 36. Variation is the point. Grammatical Range and Accuracy rewards a mix of simple and complex sentences, and an answer where every sentence is the same length reads as flat no matter how correct it is. 7 of the 12 sentences here carry a subordinate or relative clause.
The cohesive devices it uses
8 in total, spread across 5 different functions. Range matters more than count: an answer that opens every paragraph with a sequencer signals its structure but never signals a relationship between ideas, and Coherence and Cohesion is marked on both.
however, while
additionally
since
for example, such as
in conclusion
Vocabulary and repetition
Ignoring grammar words, 83 per cent of the content words in this answer are distinct, and 69 per cent appear exactly once. Lexical Resource is where repetition costs the most marks, and the usual cause is not a small vocabulary but reaching for the same noun every time the topic is named.
The longest run of words copied straight from the question is 3 words. Examiners discount wording lifted from the question, so a short run here is the right outcome: the answer restates the topic in its own words rather than borrowing the question's.
What you are marked on
All four criteria carry equal weight, and your Writing band is their average rounded to the nearest half band.
Task Response
State a clear position and defend it with relevant arguments
Coherence & Cohesion
Logical paragraphing with strong topic sentences
Lexical Resource
Precise vocabulary for trade, agriculture and policy
Grammatical Range & Accuracy
Wide range of complex structures with accuracy
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