IELTS Academic Writing Task 1: Sample 4 - PIE Chart

You should spend about 20 minutes on this task.

The pie chart shows that there are four main causes of farmland becoming degraded in the world today. Globally, 65% of degradation is caused by too much animal grazing and tree clearance, constitution 35% and 30 % respectively. A further 28 % of global degradation is due to over-cultivation of crops. Other causes account for only 7% collectively.

These causes affected different regions differently in the 1990s, with Europe having as much as 9.8 % of degradation due to deforestation, while the impact of this on Oceania and North America was minimal, with only 1.7% and 0.2% of land affected respectively. Europe, with the highest overall percentage of land degraded (23%), also suffered from over-cultivation (7. 7%) and over-grazing (5.5%). In contrast, Oceania had 13%of degraded farmland and this was mainly due to over-grazing (11.3%). North America had a lower proportion of degraded land at only 5%, and the main causes of this were over-cultivation (3.3%) and, to a lesser extent, over-grazing (1.5%).

Overall, it is clear that Europe suffered more from farmland degradation than the other regions, and the main causes there were deforestation and over-cultivation.

Reference: IELTS Book 8 TEST 1, WRITING TASK 1