4 . Mass public participation in afforestation efforts takes root. Zheng Jinran and Yuan Hui report from Chifeng, Inner Mongolia autonomous region.

In the Tengger Desert last month, yellow sand danced on the breeze and a profusion of sweetvetch（甜豆）swung its green leaves.

"In summer, you can see an amazing flower ocean when the plants bloom with their small pink, yellow or purplish petals," said Liang Cunxin, from Alshaa Left Banner, Inner Mongolia autonomous region.

"The enduring vitality of such plants on the barren land is astonishing," said the 53-year-old, whose family lived in the area for decades but was forced to relocate in 2007 as a result of desert encroachment.

"The government encouraged us to plant saxaul and little-leaf pea shrubs, which are commonly used to fix dunes in deserts, but the survival rate was unsatisfactory so we switched to this plant, and it has worked," he said.

The Tengger covers about 43,000 square kilometers in Inner Mongolia and Gansu province, making it China's fourth-largest arid area.

More than 2 million sweetvetch shrubs have been planted since 2017, and the hardy perennial has gradually covered more than 33 sq km of desert, Liang added.

Like Liang's family and their peers, about 400 million people from 30 provinces and regions have been affected by desertification, which by 2019 had covered a combined area of 1.68 million sq km, or 17.58 percent of China's total land area, according to data from the National Forestry and Grassland Administration.

The conch (海螺) is       1     (wide) considered to be the national dish of the Bahamas. Queen conch is one of important food materials and can live for 30 years.

Conches can be very     2     (expense) in the U.S. and other places. But it is so common in the Bahamas     3     it can often be found in meals costing     4    (little) than two     5     (five) of the population in rural (农村的) parts of the Bahamas eats conches weekly. The country of about 400,000 is home     6     9,000 conch fishers-around two percent of the population. This number appears to be holding steady even as conches decrease (减少) in number. For many fishers here, fishing is both a family tradition     7     a path to middle class life. The meat of the conch     8     (be) worth millions of dollars per year, and it also helps increase tourism to     9     islands.

The conch is one example of the threat (威胁) overfishing presents to traditional foods around the world. Similar problems     10     (see) in Senegal now, where overfishing has taken away white grouper. The fish has long been the basis for the national dish of thieboudienne.

Green School in Uruguay

Francesco Fassina(Ecologist and Volunteer)

Michael Reynolds (Architect)

Alicia Alvarez (School Director)

Danila Mendez (Mother of a student)

Narrator : A sunny winter’s day is great news for these Uruguayan children. As pupils of South America’s first sustainable school, they study in a building heated only using solar panels. On top of the normal school programme, they learn about recycling, energy saving,and growing their own food

Francesco Fassina: The school is an autonomous building in the sense that it isn’t connected to any energy infrastructure for water or anything. It’s sustainable in the way it functions; totally autonomous and it works thanks to its connection with nature—the sun and the rain.

Narrator : The building was funded by a local NGO and a detergent company, and designed by US architect Michael Reynolds, a self-professed “garbage warrior” who's devoted his career to building self-sufficient structures out of recyclable material.

Michael Reynolds: People called me an idiot, uh, building with garbage, what a fool, you’re a disgrace to the architectural community, uh, you know. I was trying to contain sewage and treat it and do all of these things that architects didn’ t do

Narrator : The 39 students, so me just starting pre-school and others in their final year before university learn it’s possible to live in a building that produces no waste. NGO volunteers organise regular workshops on sustainability for pupils and teachers too.

Alicia Alvarez: Little by little, we`re becoming qualified. In fact were being trained by them. We`re being trained to learn how the school works. How to maintain it so that the systems don’t deteriorate.

Narrator : Some of the children have even started educating their parents

Danila Mendez: Every day, we walk here, and he finds glass in the sand or plastic or something and he picks it up. He says. “T`m keeping this to throw it away.” He doesn’t leave it there. He picks it up and he throws it away in the right place.

Narrator : For these little garbage warriors, saving the planet has become an integral part of their homework.