5 . Some of you may play Ant Forest, a game on Alipay. Users collect “energy” to make their “trees” grow. When the “energy” reaches a certain level, some organizations and companies will plant a real tree in a desert area of China. And now it seems that the nation’s efforts as a whole to make a greener world have paid off.

According to a research by NASA, China and India are mainly responsible for making the Earth greener over the past two decades. The study has found that since 2000 the Earth’s green leaf area has increased by 5 percent, or over 5 million square kilometers. That’s an area equivalent to the total area of the Amazon rainforest. It is mainly the result of big tree-planting programs in China and intensive agriculture in both countries, according to NASA. China was the major contributor, adding 25 percent to this increase, while India added 6.8 percent.

Over the past decades, China has made great efforts to green the land. In 1978, China began a national-level forestation project – the Three North Shelterbelt Forest Program, also known as the “Great Green Wall”. The program has seen many trees planted in 13 provinces and autonomous regions in northern China to act as windbreaks, according to China Daily. By the end of 2017, the forest coverage rate among the regions of the project had reached 13.57 percent, compared to 5.05 percent 40 years ago.

In the light of China’s success in dealing with desertification, the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) believes the country is a good example for others to follow. “China is one of the most successful countries in greening the desert and has lessons to share with the world,” UNEP Executive Director Erik Solheim told Xinhua.

8 . When many of his peers (同龄人) dreamed of becoming professional footballers, firefighters or music stars, José Adolfo Quisocala, now 14, set his sights on the world of finance from an early age.

By the age of seven, attending a state school in the Peruvian city of Arequipa, he decided he wanted to create a bank for children. He was motivated by seeing his peers   skipping lunch because they had spent the little money they had on sweets or football cards. What drove him even more was the poverty he saw among children who were not attending his primary school.

The Bartselana student bank he founded now has more than 2,000 clients between the ages of 10 and 18. The children can withdraw money from the cashpoints of several banks using personal bank cards, which no one else can use, and monitor their balances online.

Seven years ago, José Adolfo managed to convince a handful of teachers and pupils that his idea could work. Then a student prize from his local town hall helped him get the support of a local cooperative to formally register his bank. Since then he has won awards nationally, then internationally.

The project of his student bank really took off when he came up with an innovative way for the children to earn money by collecting recyclable plastic or paper waste.

The children bring plastic bottles, used school exercise books and old newspapers to a kiosk (售货亭) at their school where it is weighed and their bank accounts are credited with the corresponding amount of money.

"He's making an incredible change in financial structuring and financial education that perhaps many adults could not have come up with," said Peru's environment minister, Lucía Ruiz.

"By joining that with recycling and the handling of waste, a serious problem in our country, he's scoring a double goal because he's not just designing a financial opportunity for children and teenagers but also helping to reduce the amount of waste in the country."

9 . Wildlife corridors are like safe highways for animals. These untouched areas let species move about freely to feed, breed, and migrate (迁徙) without disturbance from humans. The Vital Ground Foundation and Yellowstone to Yukon Conservation Initiative (Y2Y) bought 80 acres in northwestern Montana. The area was bought from a landowner committed to protecting open spaces over development. The area will be used to maintain wildlife habitats for species throughout the state’s northwestern corner and is particularly important for grizzly bears.

“In 2015, new science on grizzly bear connectivity identified this area as one of a few remaining connection points for grizzly bears in northwest Montana,” says Grossman, U.S. program manager for Y2Y. “Last year, the opportunity became available to work with the landowner in the area. With the rapid development of the real estate (房地产) market, we knew we needed to act quickly.”

“At the local area, this project conserves open spaces for wildlife movement,” Grossman says. She points out that grizzly bears are an umbrella species. This means that if they are doing well, most other wildlife in the ecosystem is also doing well. Bears can help us conserve habitats for a full range of plants and animals that make a functioning ecosystem that all of us need to survive. That is why this project focuses on the needs of bears.

It often becomes more difficult to preserve wildlife corridors like these. In Montana where this land has been purchased, property values have increased and land has been sold and developed quickly. Once development happens, it’s harder to conserve land and keep areas connected. “However, this change in the real estate market has led to some landowners reflecting on their values and vision for the community. In this way, it creates an opportunity for us to be able to work with people who want to see these areas remain high quality wildlife habitats, rural and undeveloped,” Grossman says.