Academic IELTS Writing Task 2 & Band 8.5 Discursive Essay
Many developing countries require aid from international organisations to develop. Many people think that this aid should be financial, while others think that practical aid and advice are more useful. Discuss both views and give your own opinion.
Sample Band 8.5
People have different views about the kind of support that wealthy nations should provide for poorer ones. Although some say that non-financial support is beneficial for poor countries, my own view is that international aid should be in the form of financial assistance.
There are several reasons to believe that practical assistance and advice are what developing countries need. Firstly, an effective education system is a key factor in the growth of a country, so advice on how to build such a system should be given to less wealthy countries. For example, since the [your country name] school curriculum focuses heavily on theories, students cannot apply what they learn into practice and come up with creative ideas, which is why the country fails to make technological and economic progress. Advice and instructions from developed countries are therefore expected to help [your country name] improve their education system. Secondly, foreign assistance can also be given in terms of providing human resources. By having an additional number of well-educated and knowledgeable individuals work in their nations, hopefully less developed countries can escape from poverty.
However, I believe that financial support would be more useful for poorer nations. One argument is that even valuable ideas for education reform may be irrelevant if a country is financially disadvantaged. In the aforementioned example about [your country name], while it seems beneficial to re-organise the education system, this cannot happen in the short runbecause there are a variety of costs associated with education reform, such as purchasing learning tools and training teachers. Furthermore, financial resources provided by rich countries may help poorer ones invest in medical and scientific research. If a sufficient amount of money is spent on these areas, technological advances are significantly more likely to be made, and such innovations can help improve the economic growth of a nation.
In conclusion, while some people argue that foreign aid given to poor countries should be non-financial, it seems to me that it is financial support that helps these nations escape from poverty.
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