While I am not the biggest fan of china on a lot of political fronts, I will admit they have been very good on the subject of climate change lately. This is positive news and I hope these kind of agreements will lead to america getting less influence on global politics.
China understands because they are going through some of the most difficult struggles with regards to fighting climate change.
Large parts of China are being swallowed by the Gobi Desert. You begin to understand how serious it is when you think about how close Beijing is to it. It would be equivelant of walking around in New York with water to your knees.
But people have said for many decades that the project is impossible. Perhaps it's why it's not covered as much as it should. It's absolutely an incredible goal.
if they manage to complete it, it will be one of the largest manmade accomplishments in the history of the world. We're talking about the largest manmade forestation in the history of human kind.
The problems are immense, and there are so many;
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three-North_Shelter_Forest_Program
Between storms, disease, overfarming, lack of biodiversity and other factors, it's a massive massive challenge. They're planting more trees for this effort than the rest of the world combined.
China is fighting its own hyper capitalism with its knowledge of what will happen to it if it doesn't take this fight head on.
But Imagine the prospect if it was possible to essential forest-ify this massive chunk of desert. I really hope they succeed, but I think it will take revolutions in technology and distribution. It will take very smart engineering and introduction of specific plants and animals to help stabilize a ecosystem that doesn't root away to vulnerable diseases.
