In an effort to encourage ecologically sustainable forestry practices an international organization started issuing certifications to wood companies that meet high ecological standards by conserving resources and recycling materials Companies that receive | TOEFL IELTS GMAT GRE SAT ACT PTE ESL

Essay topics:

In an effort to encourage ecologically sustainable forestry practices, an international organization
started issuing certifications to wood companies that meet high ecological standards by
conserving resources and recycling materials. Companies that receive this certification can
attract customers by advertising their products as “ecocertified.” Around the world, many wood
companies have adopted new, ecologically friendly practices in order to receive ecocertification.
However, it is unlikely that wood companies in the United States will do the same, for several
reasons.
First, American consumers are exposed to so much advertising that they would not value or even
pay attention to the ecocertification label. Because so many mediocre products are labeled “new”
or “improved,” American consumers do not place much trust in advertising claims in general.
Second, ecocertified wood will be more expensive than uncertified wood because in order to
earn ecocertification, a wood company must pay to have its business examined by a certification
agency. This additional cost gets passed on to consumers. American consumers tend to be
strongly motivated by price, and therefore they are likely to choose cheaper uncertified wood
products. Accordingly, American wood companies will prefer to keep their prices low rather
than obtain ecocertification.
Third, although some people claim that it always makes good business sense for American
companies to keep up with the developments in the rest of the world, this argument is not
convincing. Pursuing certification would make sense for American wood companies only if they
marketed most of their products abroad. But that is not the case—American wood businesses sell
most of their products in the United States, catering to a very large customer base that is satisfied
with the merchandise.
Well, despite what many people say, there’s good reason to think that many
American wood companies will eventually seek ecocertification for their wood
products. First off, consumers in the United States don’t treat all advertising the
same. They distinguish between advertising claims that companies make about
their own products and claims made by independent certification agencies.
Americans have a lot of confidence in independent consumer agencies. Thus,
ecologically minded Americans are likely to react very favorably to wood
products ecologically certified by an independent organization with an
international reputation for trustworthiness.
Second point—of course it’s true that American consumers care a lot about
price—who doesn’t? But studies of how consumers make decisions show that
price alone determines consumers’ decisions only when the price of one
competing product is much higher or lower than another. When the price
difference between two products is small—say, less than five percent, as is the
case with certified wood— Americans often do choose on factors other than price.
And Americans are becoming increasingly convinced of the value of preserving
and protecting the environment.
And third, U.S. wood companies should definitely pay attention to what’s going
on in the wood business internationally, not because of foreign consumers, but
because of foreign competition. As I just told you, there’s a good chance that
many American consumers will be interested in ecocertified products. And guess
what, if American companies are slow capturing those customers, you can be sure
that foreign companies will soon start crowding into the American market,
offering ecocertified wood that domestic companies don’t.
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Directions: Give yourself 20 minutes to plan and write your response. Your response is judged
on the quality of the writing and on how well it presents the points in the lecture and their
relationship to the reading passage. Typically, an effective response will be 150 to 225 words.
You may view the reading passage while you respond.
Response time: 20 minutes
Question: Summarize the points made in the lecture, being sure to explain how they cast doubt
on specific points made in the reading passage.

The lecture and the passage talk about how the American wood companies would react to eco-certification and their reasoning behind it. While the passage gives us the reasons why the companies would ignore the eco-certification, the lecture states why the companies should participate in the process. Let us discuss the same in the following paragraphs.

Firstly, the passage states that American consumers neither pay too much attention to certifications nor trust them. Whereas, the lecturer refutes this statement by saying that American consumers do trust independent agencies and their certifications on products would add value in the consumer’s eye.

Secondly, the passage specifies that the cost of such certification can be too high and thus these costs must be transferred to consumers through the rise in prices of the wood. Resultantly, consumers would prefer cheaper non-certified wood over eco-certified wood considering the prices. However, the lecturer gives us a counter argument by stating that American consumers take into consideration the varied aspects of the product, not just prices. Especially, environmentally friendly consumers would prefer to buy eco-certified wood.

Furthermore, the passage notifies that American wood companies need not pay attention to the developments in the world market because most of the consumers are American. The lecture would differ from this point of view by addressing that the competition from other countries would crowd the domestic market if the home companies fail to adapt to the developments and cater to the customers.

In conclusion, the passage and the lecture discuss the different possibilities of the American wood market based on the company’s reaction to eco-certification. On one hand, the passage disapproves of the eco-certification by American wood companies. On the other hand, the lecturer approves of this process and believes that it could be beneficial.

Votes

Essay Categories

Integrated TOEFL Writing

Comments

Essay evaluations by e-grader

Transition Words or Phrases used:
first, firstly, furthermore, however, if, second, secondly, so, thus, whereas, while, in conclusion, on the other hand

Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments

Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 4.0 10.4613686534 38% => More to be verbs wanted.
Auxiliary verbs: 12.0 5.04856512141 238% => Less auxiliary verb wanted.
Conjunction : 8.0 7.30242825607 110% => OK
Relative clauses : 7.0 12.0772626932 58% => More relative clauses wanted.
Pronoun: 19.0 22.412803532 85% => OK
Preposition: 39.0 30.3222958057 129% => OK
Nominalization: 12.0 5.01324503311 239% => Less nominalizations (nouns with a suffix like: tion ment ence ance) wanted.

Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 1661.0 1373.03311258 121% => OK
No of words: 294.0 270.72406181 109% => OK
Chars per words: 5.64965986395 5.08290768461 111% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.14082457966 4.04702891845 102% => OK
Word Length SD: 3.32236324804 2.5805825403 129% => OK
Unique words: 149.0 145.348785872 103% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.506802721088 0.540411800872 94% => More unique words wanted or less content wanted.
syllable_count: 508.5 419.366225166 121% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.7 1.55342163355 109% => OK

A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 0.0 3.25607064018 0% => OK
Article: 11.0 8.23620309051 134% => OK
Subordination: 1.0 1.25165562914 80% => OK
Conjunction: 0.0 1.51434878587 0% => OK
Preposition: 3.0 2.5761589404 116% => OK

Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 14.0 13.0662251656 107% => OK
Sentence length: 21.0 21.2450331126 99% => OK
Sentence length SD: 45.2178964932 49.2860985944 92% => OK
Chars per sentence: 118.642857143 110.228320801 108% => OK
Words per sentence: 21.0 21.698381199 97% => OK
Discourse Markers: 8.42857142857 7.06452816374 119% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 4.09492273731 122% => OK
Language errors: 0.0 4.19205298013 0% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 5.0 4.33554083885 115% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 4.0 4.45695364238 90% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 5.0 4.27373068433 117% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?

Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.102748760959 0.272083759551 38% => The similarity between the topic and the content is low.
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0436981899973 0.0996497079465 44% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0319270458119 0.0662205650399 48% => Sentences are similar to each other.
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.0660492104519 0.162205337803 41% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0245795701187 0.0443174109184 55% => OK

Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 15.7 13.3589403974 118% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 41.7 53.8541721854 77% => OK
smog_index: 11.2 5.55761589404 202% => Smog_index is high.
flesch_kincaid_grade: 12.7 11.0289183223 115% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 15.49 12.2367328918 127% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.49 8.42419426049 101% => OK
difficult_words: 71.0 63.6247240618 112% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 12.0 10.7273730684 112% => OK
gunning_fog: 10.4 10.498013245 99% => OK
text_standard: 16.0 11.2008830022 143% => OK
What are above readability scores?

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Rates: 80.0 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 24.0 Out of 30
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Note: the e-grader does NOT examine the meaning of words and ideas. VIP users will receive further evaluations by advanced module of e-grader and human graders.

Essay evaluations by e-grader

Transition Words or Phrases used:
first, firstly, furthermore, however, if, second, secondly, so, thus, whereas, while, in conclusion, on the other hand

Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments