2 . For sharks, the Mesoamerican Reef, which stretches over 600 miles, is a busy highway. Sharks use it to find their way and it provides them with food and habitat.

But as with on-land highways, this superhighway can be dangerous. Overfishing, commercial development and illegal practices are endangering the species. “We’re seeing a continued decline in shark populations. Our goal is to turn that round.” says Rachel Graham, founder of Mar Alliance, a non-profit organization focused on conserving sharks.

By monitoring sharks, Mar Alliance can collect important knowledge on the species to help inform conservation and push for political action. But rather than acting in opposition to the local fishing community, MarAlliance enlists their help.

“They are the ones who are on the sea every single day,” says Graham, “and they’re the ones who decide the species’ future.”

MarAlliance employs up to 60 fishermen across its range, mostly on a project basis, training them to collect data, record and release fish. Not only does this provide an alternative income to fishing communities, making them less dependent on natural resources, but it also teaches them about the benefits of a healthy ocean ecosystem and how to fish sustainably.

Among them, Ivan Torres, who used to catch sharks to sell locally as food, has learned how critical they’re to the whole ecosystem, saying he’d never fish sharks any more.

If this attitude change continues to spread throughout fishing communities, Graham has hope for the shark populations. “The primary threat to sharks is unquestionably overfishing,” she says, “By reforming the industry, populations can bounce back.”

In 2020, Belize outlawed the use of gillnets, large panels of netting of trapping large sealife. The ban’s impact is already noticeable with a recorded 10-fold increase in shark populations.

But such regulations need to be copied along the whole superhighway for long-lasting impact, and countries need to find a sustainable balance between fishers and the fished. “We need to find a win-win strategy between fisher livelihoods and shark survival,” Graham emphasizes. “I hope that through education and providing an economic alternative for fishing communities, MarAlliance will help ensure safe passage for sharks along the reef”.

3 . It was a turtle that changed Victoria Cairns, a headteacher from Derbyshire. She was ________ in Bali underwater when she saw one of the island’s famous ________. It approached towards her in the crystal clear water, and she was ________ at first-until she saw the plastic bag in its mouth. She just thought the human was having a destroying ________ on the environment.

She set up anti-litter social media account to ________ awareness of the damage caused by ________ pollution. She regularly picks litter around her neighbourhood. “She’s done amazing work keeping the area clean, tidy and beautiful,” says her friend.

Cairns keeps a litter-picker in her car, and will frequently ________ on the way back from work to clean something up. When running, Cairns carries a ________ litter-picker in her backpack, and picks up rubbish on her cool-down walk.

“Some people don’t ________ things. There’s no value in a plastic bag, so they ________ it away, not into the bin but on the earth somewhere. It means they are doing it when people aren’t ________, as they know it’s unacceptable.”

When she collects plastic bottles and carrier bags, it feels like a small act of care: this bag will not end up ________ a turtle’s mouth. It is a(an)________ small act in the scheme of things, but it’s something.

Cairns makes a ________ to her surroundings. She has been litter-picking in the ________ near her house. “It’s so beautiful. You get a different perspective being on the water.” she says.

4 . Germany’s top court has ruled that parts of the country’s 2019 climate (气候) action law must be changed because they don’t do a good job of protecting young people. The result is a big victory for the nine young people who started the law suing (诉讼).

The court suing stresses an important part of the climate change: The change will impact greatly on young people far more than the adults. That’s because the effects of earth warming will become more serious over time. As young people become adults, they’ll be left to deal with many problems that today’s adults have ignored. The government’s failure to plan carefully was putting their future lives in danger.

In 2019, Germany passed a new law, promising that the country would be carbon neutral (碳中和) by 2050. The law made a detailed plan of action until 2030. But the law didn’t have any specific rules or plans for climate actions that would be taken between 2031 and 2050.

Last Thursday, the judges of Germany’s highest court agreed with the young people. They said that not taking climate action made the basic rights of young people to a good future in danger.

The young people had challenged the government’s law in four specific areas. The judges didn’t agree with all of the challenges. But having the court support even a part of their case is seen as a big victory. Neubauer is one of the young people who sued. She works with the climate action group Fridays For Future. Ms. Neubauer said, “Climate protection is our basic right. This is a huge win for the climate movement. It changes a lot.”

The court has given the German government until the end of 2022 to fix the law. The climate law will now need to have a much more detailed plan for the actions that will be taken after 2030 to cut Germany’s pollution, allowing it to become carbon neutral by 2050. Germany’s government has said that it will quickly begin working to make the needed changes.

5 . Small eco-friendly(利于环保的) decisions can add up to make a huge difference to our planet. Being eco-friendly doesn’t need to empty your wallet when you travel.     1    

Make flights a little greener if you need to take a flight for a trip. Do you know flying first class can be more than five times as heavy on carbon per person as flying economy class, according to studies? Why not fly economy class?    2    Therefore, you cut down on the weight of the airplane and save fuel and baggage charges.

    3     If possible, choose the train instead of a flight. Those travelers who seek to reduce carbon emissions should seriously consider rail travel, especially for long distances.

Eat and drink locally. Step away from Starbucks and McDonald’s and seek out the best in local produce. Jonathan Engels, from Green Global Travel, recommends seeking out traditional local dishes rather than imported stuff to recreate the same unhealthy food we try to avoid at home.

    4    If you choose a vegetarian diet, it is even better.

Do not disturb. One of the simplest ways you can help the environment is by hanging up a “Do not disturb” sign on your door.     5    You save the electricity needed to vacuum(用吸尘器打扫)，and the water needed to wash sheets and clean bathrooms, not to mention the harmful chemicals used in the cleaning process. Best of all, some hotel chains reward you for choosing not to have your room cleaned.

As we all know, plastic bags     1     (exist) for decades. There is no doubt that they do damage     2     our environment. With the growing use of plastic bags, people produce large     3     (amount) of waste. They are easily blown away by wind and flowing water so they can travel long distances. They can last for hundreds of years in the environment!

9 . The world is lucky when our most brilliant minds choose to work for the common good. Young Ryan Honary is among one of the brilliant minds.

Shocked by the deaths in the 2018 Camp Fire, California’s frightening wildfire, Honary turned his attention to how to decrease future disasters. In 2019, Honary won a $10,000 prize in the Ignite Innovation Student Challenge for his early wildfire detection (检测) network, which provides app technology for firefighters. He was only in fifth grade at the time.

Turning 14 years old and going into the eighth grade this year, Honary is busy working in SensoRy AI, the company he set up. With the help of his father and a team of experts, the company has received a lot of attention.

Honary started creating websites when he was in third grade. He learned Python and JavaScript in a local after-school program. At the same time, he was interested in animals and the environment. He became worried as he saw how much the environment was under pressure.

When wildfires started ruining the air quality, destroying homes and killing some people, Honary thought about how AI can be used to solve environmental problems such as wildfires. In order to get data to train the machine learning models on his fire detectors, he collected real-world data from Google Earth about the Camp Fire of 2018 in California. Once a fire is detected by a fire detector, the information can be sent to the app he created. Also, machine learning can be used to predict where the fires are going.

Honary is hoping to attract more people from his generation to his company. He believes the environment is going to be a big responsibility for all of us.