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Welcome! This site is for students to practice their English and keep up to date with environmental issues.

TEN MINUTES OF ENGLISH A DAY!
You can find a mixture of reading, crosswords, videos and short English lessons: these will normally be vocabulary, but I may also treat you to some grammar!

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''Let nature be your teacher''
William Wordsworth, poet, 1770-1850

''Joy in looking and comprehending is nature's most beautiful gift''
Albert Einstein, physicist, 1879-1955

''... to find the word, or words, by which [an] idea may be most fitly and aptly expressed''
P.M. Roget, lexicographer, 1779-1869

Monday, 7 October 2013

Chinas Green Wall - video lesson 21

Level: Intermediate / B1

Please click the 'Print Friendly' icon below if you want to print this exercise

The Gobi Desert is spreading. Here is a six-minute video looking at how the Chinese are trying to stop it.

Watch the video and then answer the following questions:
1)  In China, how many people are threatened by desertification? (00:37 seconds into the video)
2)  What is 'the silent crisis'? (00:55)
3)  When do the enormous sandstorms occur in China? (01:12)
4)  How much forest will be planted between 2005 and 2020 ? (01:47)
5)  How far south is Beijing from the desert? (02:07)
6)  What policies does the Forestry Bureau have to protect forests? (02:24)
7)  The size of the desert has dropped from _____________ ha to ___________ ha (02:48)
8)  Why are environmentalists critical of the project? (04:33)
9)  How much water is there for each person in Beijing? (05:13)
10) How much does all the work on Beijing's rivers cost? (05:50)

Answers below!


ANSWERS:

1)  400 million
2)  Soil erosion
3)  Every spring
4)  40 million ha
5)  A day's drive south
6)  It is forbidden to graze animals on open land, they have fenced areas and used airplanes to sow seeds
7)  140,000 to 40,000
8)  They say that the trees put pressure on vital ground water
9)  120 cubic metres
10) Nearly $3bn

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