Cambridge IELTS 19 – Sample Answers

Today, I’m going to give you my band 9 sample answers to four writing questions from Cambridge IELTS 19, which is (as of September 2024) the latest of the Cambridge IELTS book series. These are all task 2 questions.

Please do not view these as templates to copy. When it comes to IELTS writing, you should use your own words and ideas. However, you can learn from my model essays by thinking about the language, the structures, the ideas, and the grammar that I have used. This video explains how you should use model essays.

Question #1

In many countries nowadays, consumers can go to a supermarket and buy food produced all over the world.

Do you think this is a positive or negative development?

Answer

Around the world, it is now quite common for people to shop in supermarkets whereas in the past they might have instead gone to a local market to buy produce. This essay will argue that it is generally a good thing because it gives people more choice.

First of all, supermarkets tend to be able to source food from around the world in a way that smaller shops and market vendors cannot, and this means the consumer is given a much larger choice when they do their shopping. Choice can be seen as positive for a number of reasons, including the fact that people seem to enjoy experiencing new flavours. It is generally true that people in most parts of the world get a sort of satisfaction from food and trying new foods often brings people a sense of happiness and reward. People in the United Kingdom, for example, love eating food from China and India whilst people in Japan often adore French and Italian cuisine. When these products or ready-made meals are available in supermarkets, it is not only the wealthiest people who can enjoy them. Almost everyone can go to a supermarket, buy these products, and then take them home for dinner.

In addition to this being a pleasant experience, it can also be a healthy one. It is true that supermarkets sell a lot of processed foods, which are unhealthy, but they offer people a huge selection of fruits, vegetables, and grains from around the world. In the northern hemisphere, where it is cold for much of the year, local farmers cannot grow many fruits, and they also struggle to produce spices. However, supermarkets can import these items in vast quantities and make them affordable. With more selection, people can get more vitamins and minerals. They do not have to rely on local suppliers. That means people may not have to forgo vitamin C during the winter, for example, and might instead get a diverse range of micronutrients, which is beneficial for their health.

In conclusion, supermarkets that import foreign foods can be seen as a generally positive development. Some might say they hurt local suppliers, but overall they provide people with a bigger range of food, which is the most important factor.

Notes

For this essay, I wanted to strongly agree that supermarkets are a good thing, and so I broke my argument down into two main positives:

1. Consumer choice
2. Healthier diets

These are definitely linked, so I was careful not to repeat myself. It would be easy to say that consumers have more choice, which allows them to choose healthier diets. That would certainly make one good paragraph, but as you can see I have decided to really expand each point and make them into separate paragraphs.

The reason for that is that I felt it was more convincing and avoided having to put less convincing additional ideas into my essay. Also, remember that being able to really explain something (i.e. develop your ideas) is key to getting a good score for Task Response.

You can see more vocabulary related to health health.

Question #2

Some people think that competition at work, at school and in daily life is a good thing. Others believe that we should try to cooperate more, rather than competing against each other.

Discuss both these views and give your own opinion.

Answer

Whilst some people believe that competition is beneficial, others think people should cooperate more. This essay will argue that both approaches can be positive, but it depends on the situation.

First of all, competition can be very helpful for people in different situations. In the workplace, for example, people who compete with their co-workers might perform better, which results in a more productive company. In the sales industry, it is extremely common for this practice to occur, and companies that best handle the competitive element tend to make more sales and thus they have better profits. In education, competition can be positive as well because it prepares students for the harsh realities of life, whilst also motivating them to learn more.

On the other hand, competition can be detrimental because it often encourages selfishness and can destructive attitudes. In the previous examples, the positives can also be outweighed by the negatives in some cases. A salesperson who is too competitive might annoy their co-workers, resulting in a bad working environment. When only one person is successful and the others are demoralised, the overall sales might decline. Meanwhile, students at school may suffer from the pressure of a competitive environment and those who fail might lose the will to continue learning. As such, cooperation must also be encouraged. This allows people to balance the self-centred competitive approach with a more team-oriented one, offsetting some of the potential negatives.

In conclusion, both competition and cooperation are important in various aspects of life. It would be best to emphasise the benefits of each and to encourage some sort of balance between them so that people learn lessons from both.

Notes

Here, I decided to give a balanced answer, and I chose a rather interesting structure to do so:

Rather than just give the positives of each side, I felt like I should mention the negatives of competition. That’s because I felt that if I simply talked about the positives, the competitive side had an edge. In other words, my arguments in favour of competition were too strong.

By providing some negatives of competition alongside the positives of cooperation, I felt that the essay was more balanced, which justified my position as stated in the introduction and conclusion.

In terms of language, you will notice that there is some repetition here. The words “competition” and “cooperation” were repeated quite a lot. There are different ways to avoid repetition, but sometimes it is impossible without really destroying your coherence. That’s because not all words have direct synonyms and you end up paraphrasing awkwardly to remove one word. However, I don’t feel that the repetition here was extreme enough to really cause me any problems in terms of my score.

Question #3

It is important for everyone, including young people, to save money for their future.

To what extent do you agree or disagree with this statement?

Answer

People have different views about money and whether or not to save it, but most people agree that doing so is a very good idea. This essay will largely agree but with a warning about the dangers of inflation, which could undermine the good intentions of someone who saves.

First of all, saving money for the future is almost universally agreed to be a smart idea because if people simply spend their money when they get it, they might struggle later. This could be due to the sudden need for money in situations such as medical emergencies, or it could be because they want to make a large purchase without taking a loan. Then, of course, there is the fact that people should realise that one day they may retire and need money to rely upon because they are no longer able to work for a living. For all these reasons and more, saving for the future is a very good idea and something that people should do from a young age.

Even so, people should be careful and consider a diversification of their assets. That is because of something called inflation. Inflation means that the value of money goes down, so even if someone saved every year, under certain circumstances they might not actually end up with enough money in the future, and perhaps they would even have less purchasing power than they began with. If someone put aside only a little money each year but inflation was very high in their country, their money might be wasted because when eventually they need it the money is no longer worth much. To hedge against this, people should try to invest in assets whose value increases over time. People often do this with gold, property, bitcoin, or shares in companies. This can be risky, but if done well it can offset the risks of saving money in an inflationary environment.

In conclusion, it is certainly a good idea for people to save money for the future, but they should be aware that this does not guarantee them financial security because inflation can devalue the money they have saved, undoing the good work they did.

Notes

For this essay, I took what seemed like a very simple question and added a complex dimension to it. Instead of just saying basics (saving is good because it provides security), I decided to go into more detail and provide a small amount of balance.

Note that I also used a lot of financial vocabulary:

• the dangers of inflation
• medical emergencies
• taking a loan
• they may retire
• work for a living
• saving for the future
• diversification of their assets
• the value of money
• purchasing power
• hedge against
• invest in assets
• saving money in an inflationary environment
• financial security
• devalue the money they have saved

Some of these were simple terms and others were more complex, but the important thing is that they have been used correctly. I cannot stress that enough. Many IELTS candidates would be tempted to use random words and phrases they have learned, which they believe are “advanced” or “uncommon.” Unless these are correctly used, they will not help you. You must always strive for the right word, not a fancy one.

Question #4

The working week should be shorter and workers should have a longer weekend.

Do you agree or disagree?

Answer

In the modern era, it is common for people to work excessive hours and lack the required free time to engage in hobbies and other leisure activities. This essay will argue that it would be good for this to change.

To begin with, the tendency to work many hours per week is something of a modern health crisis that has reached epidemic levels. All across the developed world, people feel it is necessary for their career to do overtime or even be on-call twenty-four hours per day. This causes them to lack sleep, stay at their computer for long periods, and miss out on healthy activities like sport and gentle exercise. Because these are all important for our physical health, the present situation is destroying people’s bodies and causing them to get sick more and live shorter lives. If the working week were made shorter and the weekend were made longer, this situation might improve.

In addition to the damaging effect that this situation has on people’s physical health, it is also extremely damaging to their mental well-being. Leisure activities afford people a break from the stress and monotony of working life, as well as a chance to socialise with others. When deprived of this, people can begin to get depressed, anxious, or suffer from other mental health problems. For example, a person who engages in sport on the weekend might find himself isolated from his friends after being required to work through the weekend. This loneliness could trigger a psychological breakdown. If people had longer weekends, they would have more time to do things that are important to them, thereby improving their mental health.

In conclusion, even though it might be difficult to make this happen due to companies’ interest in making profits, it would be beneficial for most people if working weeks were shortened and weekends lengthened.

Notes

You can see that I have divided my ideas into two areas:

1. physical health benefits
2. mental health benefits

This allowed me to easily group my ideas and then expand upon them logically. It is really important to have a good structure for your essay, so that you can do this effectively.

I have also been realistic here. A lot of IELTS candidates tend to come up with very extreme ideas. They might say “People who work too much have heart attacks and die.” Well, that can be true but it’s not very common. It’s better to focus on common and realistic ideas and to explain them in a sensible way.

In terms of vocabulary, you can see once again that I have used some topic-specific language. This actually comes from multiple topics: health, work, and society. That’s because this essay doesn’t neatly fit into just one IELTS topic. Rather, it sort of mixes two or three of them.

Finally, we have seen some different question types here. I have guides to answering questions from each of these:

• Discuss both views
• Agree or disagree
• Positive or negative