【推荐1】Farmer Pak Sadiman has made it his task to raise awareness and do something about Central Java’s water shortage problem, little by little.

He has changed his dry village into a groundwater haven by planting trees on nearby land for the last 19 years, and he’s encouraging others to join in, too.

Sadiman realised that the land was in need of some water when the Gendol River—previously the source of water for villagers—was quickly drying up. Even rubber trees, the local people’s main source of income, were so dry that they could no longer produce rubber latex. It was then that Sadiman took action so that generations to come could benefit from the planted trees.

“Banyan trees, unlike rubber trees, can keep groundwater. The more banyan trees are planted, the more clean water villagers will get,” he thought. Although he would often find his seeds dug up by cattle, the farmer never became discouraged from achieving his goal—providing his village with a clean water source.

He’s planted at least 11,000 trees over the last 19 years, and his village seems to have escaped from the dry season. Villagers have joined in Sadiman’s efforts and given him free seeds or worked alongside him to plant the trees. “Pak Sadiman is our hero. This village used to fight with water shortage, but now we have enough water because of him,” the local chief said.

Sadiman said as long as he’s physically healthy and fit, he’ll continue to plant trees and finish his vision of avoiding drought and help provide clean water for his fellow villagers.

【推荐2】The Himalayan Mountains are home to the highest peak in Mount Everest. Now the first complete study of this remote region shows that its glaciers（冰川）lost billions of tons of ice from 2000 to 2016.

This is the first comprehensive look at what's happened to glaciers in the Himalaya over a 40-year time, said lead author Joshua Masurer.

“Our study shows a strong signal of glacier ice loss linked to rising temperatures from climate change,” Maurer says. As much as quarter of the regions ice has been lost, he said, “Temperatures in the region have risen one degree, and one degree was indeed enough to produce such a great loss of glacier ice.”

The signal showing Himalayan ice loss linked to rising temperatures would not be so clear if it weren't for the U.S satellites that photographed the region. Declassified（解密的）photos from those satellites were turned into 3-D models to show what the glaciers' elevations（海拔高度）and sizes were in the 1970s, Maurer said. Those were then compared to more recent complex NASA satellite photos that show changing elevations of the ice over time.

The ice and snow in the region are the source for Asia's great rivers. The study did not include the huge neighbouring ranges of high mountains, but other studies suggest that similar melting is under way there as well.

This melting means flooding and the creation of many glacial lakes. In May 2012, one such flood killed over 60 people in villages near Pokhara, Nepal; it also destroyed houses. Some 800 million people depend in part on rivers from Himalayan glaciers for irrigation, making electricity, and drinking water. The more rapid melting appears to increase the river water during warm seasons, but scientists say that will decrease within decades as the glaciers lose mass.