1 . 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”.

2 . 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.

3 . 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.

7 . Five years ago, we cut nearly every single tree across 19 acres here, piled and burned the branches and left the trunks where they lay. The goal was to restore one of the Ozarks’ rarest ecosystems, a type of dry and rocky grassland.

Logging down trees to bring back grass may seem puzzling in a time of climate change, as forest conservation and tree planting have become popular ways to keep carbon out of the atmosphere. But it is exactly what we should do in some parts of the Southeast. The climate and biodiversity crises are problems to be solved together. We can’t afford to rob biodiversity to pay for the climate. And grasslands are surprisingly good at pulling carbon out of the atmosphere. A single sunflower might not be the carbon grab that an oak tree is, but grass’s deep root systems store the element deep underground, where it can take hundreds or thousands of years to return to the atmosphere.

For the past century, the commonly held belief was that forests once covered most of the region from the Atlantic Ocean to the Mississippi River. But we now know that’s not true. Much of the Southeast was a string of large and small grassland ecosystems with enormous biodiversity. All of these unique grasslands are under threat, but not all by tree invasion. The few remaining grasslands in Arkansas are being converted to grow rice, Virginia grasslands are being flattened by housing developers, and low-lying coastal grassy plain is facing sea-level rise. Because grasslands are so easily navigated (导航) and settled, they may be the most threatened ecosystems in the world.

And it’s obvious that everywhere, grasslands remain undervalued. Many conservation organizations working in the Southeast are still focused on tree planting and preserving existing forests. The Nature Conservancy’s Cumberland Forest Project covers 253, 000 acres of land in Kentucky, Tennessee and Virginia, part of an effort to store carbon and create continuous habitats for species migration during climate change. In fact, recent laws are beginning to lead us in the right direction.

9 . With greater climate catastrophe (气候突变) on Earth, it is natural for us to make every effort to stop the potential floods, snowstorms, and alarming reports from scientists. For many of us (myself included), part of that means running out to buy reusable straws, organic cleaners, and packaging-free products.

However, before you rejoice in “green” purchases, take a second to consider the results of a new study from Arizona University. By comparing the shopping habits, mental health and environmental impact of young people, the researchers reaffirmed a principle: Buying less beats buying “green” stuff without effort. And that is true whether you are looking at the impact that your purchases have on the Earth or on your own happiness.

It should not come as a shock that simply consuming less is better for the planet. After all, every new item a factory yields requires some resources to produce. Take plastic bag bans for instance. If your city is getting rid of single-use shopping bags, it can be tempting to pay for a fashionable organic cotton bag hanging in the check-out line of your local supermarket. However, experts insist that growing cotton is actually no better for the Earth than producing the conventional plastic bags. Your best bet for carrying your groceries if you care about sustainability? Any bag you already own. This is true of many kinds of “green” products.

It is not just the Earth that will be happier if you buy less. You will feel more contented too, according to the new study. “People believe that they might well be self-satisfied about becoming environmentally conscious through green buying patterns, but it doesn't seem to be that way”, said the lead researcher Sabrina Helm. “Reduced consumption has effects on increased well-being and decreased psychological distress, but we don't see that with green consumption.”

“Owning every new green product on the market might make you feel contented, but if you relieve yourself of that burden of ownership, most people report feeling a lot better,” said Helm.

Dongying city in China’s Shandong Province has witnessed(目睹) ecological improvements in the Yellow River Delta, thanks to various    1    (effect) measures to improve wetland restoration and protection.

Years ago, the wetlands there    2    (threaten) due to less water from the river and other factors.    3    (protect) the wetlands ecosystem, the Yellow River Delta National Nature Reserve was established in 1992. Since then, the city    4    (carry) out several management projects and restored the biotic(生物) population in the zone.

Dongying has been adopting a comprehensive wetlands restoration model by giving high     5    (prior) to protecting the nature reserve and letting nature restore     6    (it). Over the past three years, it’s transferred(转运) 469 million cubic meters of water to the nature reserve,    7    has recovered the ecological functions of the wetlands there.

Last year, Dongying built a real-time monitoring network for bird species at the nature reserve, which helps ensure that birds are free    8    disturbance of human activity and puts the habitats of cranes and other species under key protection. As a result, the nature reserve has seen    9    obvious increase in the variety and number of bird species. Home to 371 bird species, it’s become an important stop, wintering ground and breeding place for migratory birds. Dongying is currently working to build the Yellow River Estuary National Park, which will cover 3,523 square kilometers,    10    (include) land area and sea area, to explore pathways for the protection of Delta ecology.