Hope in a Changing Climate - by John D. Liu (2009)

Summary

The video script details the remarkable transformation of China's Loess Plateau, once a barren and impoverished region, into a fertile and prosperous landscape. Through large-scale ecological restoration efforts, local communities have reversed environmental degradation, increased agricultural productivity, and improved their livelihoods. The project's success showcases the potential for similar initiatives worldwide to combat climate change, enhance food security, and restore natural ecosystems.

Takeaways

• 🌱 The Loess Plateau in China was once one of the poorest regions, known for floods, mudslides, and famine.
• 📹 John D. Liu has documented the transformation of the plateau into a green and fertile landscape over 15 years.
• 🌳 The project involved local people constructing a new landscape on a vast scale, which changed Liu's life and career.
• 🏞️ The degradation of the plateau was caused by thousands of years of unsustainable agricultural practices and overgrazing.
• 🌍 The environmental degradation led to a cycle of poverty and further environmental harm, affecting not just the local area but also downstream regions.
• 🌿 The restoration efforts focused on stopping farming in key areas to allow for the regrowth of vegetation, which was crucial for the success of the project.
• 💧 The project resulted in increased agricultural productivity due to the return of natural vegetation and improved water retention in the soil.
• 🌿 The restoration has had a significant impact on a large area, reducing soil erosion and the amount of silt flowing into the Yellow River.
• 🌱 The success of the project on the Loess Plateau has inspired similar efforts in other countries, such as Ethiopia and Rwanda.
• 🌿 Restoring natural ecosystems not only helps combat climate change by sequestering carbon but also improves water security, food production, and biodiversity.

Q & A

What was the Loess Plateau known for before the transformation projects?

Before the transformation projects, the Loess Plateau was known for being one of the poorest regions in China, with a history of floods, mudslides, and famine.

Who is John D. Liu and what is his role in the Loess Plateau's transformation?

John D. Liu is a filmmaker and ecological scientist who has been documenting the changes on the Loess Plateau for 15 years. He was initially there to film an ambitious project where local people were constructing a new landscape on a vast scale.

What were the primary causes of the environmental degradation on the Loess Plateau?

The primary causes of environmental degradation on the Loess Plateau were thousands of years of agricultural exploitation that denuded the hills and valleys of vegetation, and relentless grazing that prevented young trees and shrubs from growing.

How did the degradation of the Loess Plateau contribute to the Yellow River's problems?

The degradation led to millions of tons of silt being swept down into the Yellow River, which got its name from the color of the fine loose soil. The silt clogged up the river, impeding its flow and contributing to floods and dust storms.

What was the strategy implemented to combat the degradation and improve the Loess Plateau's environment?

The strategy involved ceasing farming on certain key areas to allow trees and shrubs to grow back, building terraces for crop planting, and constructing dams to retain water and restore fertility to the land.

What were the 'hats, belts, and shoes' mentioned in the script?

The 'hats' referred to replanting the tops of hills with trees, the 'belts' meant building terraces for crops and trees, and the 'shoes' were dams constructed at the base of the hills to retain water and help the land recover.

How did the transformation projects impact the local population's livelihood?

The projects led to a marked increase in agricultural productivity and a threefold rise in incomes for the local population. They were able to improve their environment, reduce poverty, and enhance food security.

What is the significance of the vegetation restoration on the Loess Plateau in terms of climate change?

The restoration of vegetation on the Loess Plateau has helped sequester carbon from the atmosphere, countering the effects of human greenhouse gas emissions, and improved the region's ability to resist negative impacts of climate change.

Can the success of the Loess Plateau's rehabilitation be replicated in other countries facing similar environmental challenges?

The script suggests that the principles and strategies used in the Loess Plateau's rehabilitation could be applied elsewhere, as evidenced by similar projects in Ethiopia and Rwanda, which have shown promising results.

What are the broader implications of restoring degraded landscapes as seen in the Loess Plateau and other regions?

Restoring degraded landscapes can sequester carbon, reduce biodiversity loss, mitigate against flooding and drought, ensure food security, and provide multiple benefits for climate change mitigation and the future of essential ecosystem services.

Why is it important to invest in the recovery of damaged environments according to the script?

Investing in the recovery of damaged environments is a cost-effective way to solve many problems, including carbon sequestration, biodiversity loss, and ensuring food and water security, while also providing fundamental services that are often taken for granted.

Outlines

00:00

🌱 Restoring the Loess Plateau: A Journey of Transformation

The Loess Plateau in China, once impoverished and prone to natural disasters, has undergone a remarkable transformation. John D. Liu, a soil scientist, has documented the changes over 15 years. The area, known for floods, mudslides, and famine, has seen local communities construct a new landscape on a massive scale, turning barren land into a fertile, green one. This project has not only changed the environment but also the lives of the people, lifting them out of poverty and reducing the threat of climate change. The key to this change was halting agricultural exploitation and allowing vegetation to recover, which improved the region's fertility and reduced soil erosion into the Yellow River.

05:02

🌾 Reversing Environmental Degradation: A Global Challenge

The Loess Plateau serves as a case study for how damaged environments and human poverty are interconnected. The cycle of subsistence farming has led to further land degradation, prompting the question of whether this process can be reversed. Chinese and international experts believed it could be, and they initiated a project to halt farming in key areas to allow for natural regrowth. This required the consent of the local farmers, who were initially skeptical but were eventually convinced by the promise of land tenure and direct benefits from the project. The initiative aimed to 'give a hat to the hilltops, a belt to the hills, and shoes at the base,' meaning replanting trees, building terraces for crops and trees, and constructing dams to restore the landscape's vitality.

10:03

🌳 The Power of Vegetation: Transforming Lives and Landscapes

The restoration efforts on the Loess Plateau have led to significant changes in vegetation cover, which in turn has transformed the lives of the local people. They have terraced fields, improved soils, and protected marginal areas, resulting in increased agricultural productivity. The return of natural vegetation has also helped retain water during rainfall, reducing the risk of floods and improving irrigation. The project's success has had a broader impact, reducing soil erosion into the Yellow River and demonstrating the potential for large-scale ecosystem restoration to combat climate change.

15:05

💧 Water Restoration in Ethiopia: A Beacon of Hope

The narrative shifts to Ethiopia, where environmental degradation has led to similar challenges as the Loess Plateau. However, there is hope for reversal, as seen in the work of Professor Lessa Nash and local villagers. They have transformed eroded terrain by planting indigenous trees and plants, leading to the emergence of a clear-flowing stream where there was once a muddy trickle. This demonstrates the critical role of vegetation in maintaining water sources and the potential for restoration projects to improve livelihoods and combat climate change.

20:08

🌍 Global Lessons from Local Actions: Restoring Ecosystems for a Sustainable Future

The success of the Loess Plateau and Ethiopian projects highlights the potential for large-scale ecosystem restoration. These initiatives have shown that it is possible to rehabilitate degraded environments, which can sequester carbon, reduce biodiversity loss, and mitigate the effects of climate change. The benefits are not just environmental; they also include improved food and water security. The call is for developed countries to recognize the potential of restoration and invest in it as a solution to multiple global challenges, emphasizing the need for global action to restore and protect natural ecosystems.

25:11

🌿 The Value of Natural Capital: Investing in Ecosystem Recovery

The final paragraph emphasizes the importance of investing in the recovery of damaged environments as a cost-effective solution to various global problems. It discusses the potential of restoring vast areas of degraded land and the multiple benefits this can bring, including carbon sequestration, biodiversity conservation, and ensuring food and water security. The narrative suggests that investing in ecological infrastructure and ecosystems is a way to address climate change and other challenges, and it calls for a global scale-up of such restoration efforts.

Keywords

💡Loess Plateau

The Loess Plateau, also known as China's Loess Plateau, is a region stretching across North Central China, covering approximately 640,000 square kilometers. It is renowned for its fertility when undisturbed but has been historically plagued by environmental degradation due to deforestation and unsustainable agricultural practices. In the video, the Loess Plateau is central to the narrative of ecological restoration, where efforts have been made to transform barren land into a fertile and green landscape, illustrating the potential for large-scale environmental recovery.

💡Environmental Degradation

Environmental degradation refers to the deterioration of the environment through processes such as deforestation, soil erosion, and pollution. In the context of the video, the Loess Plateau suffered from severe degradation due to centuries of unsustainable agricultural practices, leading to soil erosion, loss of vegetation, and increased susceptibility to natural disasters like floods and dust storms. The script describes how this degradation not only affected local communities but also had broader environmental impacts, such as contributing to the siltation of the Yellow River.

💡Ecological Restoration

Ecological restoration is the process of repairing damaged ecosystems to improve their health and restore their functions. The video showcases the ambitious project on the Loess Plateau where local communities, with the help of experts, undertook large-scale efforts to restore the landscape. This involved planting trees, constructing terraces, and building dams to retain soil and water, aiming to reverse the cycle of degradation and enhance the region's ecological health.

💡Soil Erosion

Soil erosion is the process by which the topsoil is worn away by natural forces like wind and water, or by human activities. The video script mentions that the relentless grazing and poor agricultural practices on the Loess Plateau led to severe soil erosion, which not only reduced the land's fertility but also contributed to the siltation of the Yellow River, causing floods and other environmental problems. The restoration efforts on the plateau focused on combating soil erosion by replanting vegetation and constructing terraces.

💡Vegetation Cover

Vegetation cover refers to the extent of an area that is covered by plants, which is crucial for maintaining soil health, preventing erosion, and supporting biodiversity. In the video, the restoration of vegetation cover on the Loess Plateau is highlighted as a key component of the ecological restoration process. The return of trees and shrubs not only helped to stabilize the soil but also improved water retention, leading to increased agricultural productivity and a reduction in erosion.

💡Subsistence Farming

Subsistence farming is a type of agriculture where farmers produce just enough food to support themselves and their families, without generating surplus for sale. The video script describes how the degradation of the environment on the Loess Plateau trapped local populations into a cycle of subsistence farming, where they were forced to overuse their land to survive, further depleting its fertility. The restoration efforts aimed to break this cycle by improving land fertility and agricultural productivity.

💡Climate Change

Climate change refers to long-term shifts in global or regional climate patterns, often attributed to human activities such as the emission of greenhouse gases. The video discusses how the restoration of ecosystems on the Loess Plateau can help mitigate the impacts of climate change by increasing vegetation cover, which in turn sequesters carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. The script also suggests that healthy ecosystems are more resilient to the negative effects of climate change.

💡Carbon Sequestration

Carbon sequestration is the process by which carbon dioxide is removed from the atmosphere and stored in plants, soils, and other media. The video emphasizes the role of restored vegetation on the Loess Plateau in sequestering carbon, contributing to the mitigation of climate change. It suggests that investing in ecological restoration and expanding the capacity of natural ecosystems to sequester carbon is a cost-effective strategy for addressing climate change.

💡Biodiversity

Biodiversity refers to the variety of life in an area, including the number of species, their genetic diversity, and the complexity of ecosystems. The video script highlights the importance of restoring ecosystems not only for carbon sequestration but also for preserving biodiversity. It suggests that the loss of biodiversity can have cascading effects on ecosystems and the services they provide, such as food and water security.

💡Sustainable Agriculture

Sustainable agriculture is an approach to farming that aims to meet food production needs while maintaining environmental health and social equity. The video discusses how the restoration of the Loess Plateau involved transitioning from unsustainable agricultural practices that led to environmental degradation to more sustainable methods, such as terrace farming and agroforestry, which improved land fertility and agricultural productivity without further degrading the environment.

Highlights

China's Loess Plateau was once one of the poorest regions in the country, known for floods, mudslides, and famine.

John D. Liu has documented the transformation of the plateau into a green and fertile landscape over 15 years.

Local people constructed a new landscape on a vast scale, aiming to transform barren land.

The project's success convinced Liu to become a soil scientist, realizing human tragedies like floods and famines are not inevitable.

The Loess Plateau's degradation was due to thousands of years of agricultural exploitation and overgrazing.

The region's fertility was destroyed over millennia, causing massive silt deposits in the Yellow River and contributing to floods.

Degradation of the environment trapped the local population into a life of subsistence farming.

Chinese and international experts believed the destructive process could be reversed by ceasing farming on key areas.

Farmers were persuaded to participate in the project with the assurance of land tenure and direct benefits.

The goal was to 'give a hat to the hilltops, a belt to the hills, and shoes at the base' to restore the landscape.

Restoration efforts have resulted in a 35,000 square km area with significant reduction in soil erosion into the Yellow River.

The project has shown that damaged environments can be restored, improving local livelihoods and ecosystems.

Incomes in the area have risen threefold, and there's been a global benefit through carbon sequestration.

The lessons from the Loess Plateau are being applied across China, with potential for global application.

In Ethiopia, similar restoration efforts have transformed eroded terrain and improved water availability.

Restoration in Ethiopia has led to food security, reduced dependence on government aid, and returned wildlife to the area.

Rwanda's efforts to restore wetlands have improved hydro power, reduced reliance on diesel generators, and stabilized electricity prices.

Restoring natural ecosystems like wetlands has multiple benefits, including climate change mitigation and water security.

Investing in ecological infrastructure and expanding nature's ability to sequester carbon is a cost-effective solution to many problems.

Restoration can sequester carbon, reduce biodiversity loss, and ensure food security, with global implications.

The potential of restoration to address climate change and other global challenges is significant and should be recognized and scaled up.

Transcripts

this is China's lus

Plateau until recently this was one of

the poorest regions in the

country a land renowned for floods

mudslides and famine but with the

Fanfare comes the hope of change for the

better my name is John D Liu I've been

documenting the changes on the plateau

for 15

years I first came here in

1995 to film an ambitious project where

local people were constructing a new

landscape on a vast

[Music]

scale transforming a Barren land into a

green and fertile

one the project certainly changed my

life convincing me to become a soil

science

the lessons I've learned in the last few

years have made me realize that many of

the human tragedies that we regularly

witness around the world the floods

mudslides droughts and famines are not

[Music]

inevitable here on the LC Plateau I've

witnessed that people can lift

themselves out of

poverty they can radically improve their

environment and by doing so reduce the

threat of climate

[Music]

[Applause]

[Music]

change when I first came to the LC

Plateau I was astounded by the degree of

poverty and

degradation and I wondered how could the

Chinese people the largest ethnic group

on the planet and my fathers and my own

ancestors come from a place that was

this

Barren China's L Plateau is a region

that stretches for 640,000 square km

across North Central

China unspoiled valleys in neighboring

Sichuan show us how it might once have

looked it's the sort of Natural

Abundance that is necessary to support

an emerging

civilization how How could a landscape

with such potential have been reduced to

[Music]

this when Chinese scientists and civil

engineers began to survey the area they

realized that several thousand years of

agricultural exploitation had denuded

The Hills and Valleys of

vegetation the Relentless grazing of

domestic animals on the slopes meant

that there was no chance for for young

trees and shrubs to

[Music]

grow the rainfall no longer seeped into

the Earth but simply washed down the

hillsides taking the soil with

it over Millennia this progressively

destroyed the Region's

fertility

when this happens over an area as

extensive as the plateau millions of

tons of silt are swept down into the

Yellow River which gets its name from

the color of the fine loose

soil the mounting quantities of silt

plog up the river impeding its flow

contributing to the floods that give the

river another

name China

[Music]

sorrow in some areas creating floating

mud mattresses that attract passing

tourists a local problem becomes a

national

problem in the dry season the light

unprotected soil is swept up in the

winds causing the dust storms that are

blown over China's cities and Beyond its

borders on the plateau the researchers

realized that Progressive degradation of

of the environment trapped the local

population into a life of subsistence

farming it's a process that has occurred

throughout the world where poor

agricultural communities find themselves

overusing their land in order to survive

depleting its fertility and further

impoverishing

themselves one thing that became

apparent early on is the connection

between damaged environments and human

poverty in many parts of the world

there's been a vicious cycle continuous

use of the land has led to subsistence

Agriculture and Generation by generation

this has further degraded the

soils the vital question we have to ask

is can this destructive process be

reversed 15 years ago Chinese and

international experts were confident it

could

[Music]

be they decided Ed that to prevent

further erosion it was necessary to

cease farming on certain key areas to

allow the trees and shrubs to grow

back but this could not happen without

the consent of the farmers

themselves they took some

persuading of course a lot of people

didn't understand the project they

weren't thinking in the long

term

they want us to plant trees

everywhere even in the good

land what about the Next

Generation they can't eat

trees what eventually convinced the

local people was the assurance that they

would have tenure of their

land that they would directly benefit

from the effort they invested in the new

project the goal was to give a hat to

the hilltops give a belt to the hills as

well as shoes at the

base the hats meant that the top of

these Hills had to be replanted with

trees

the belt meant that Terraces had to be

built to be used for crop planting and

also for

trees the shoes were the dams which we

had to build so that the hills could

grow back to life and our economy as

well as our lives could

[Music]

improve

Hills and gullies were designated as

ecological zones to be

protected farmers were given financial

compensation for not farming on them and

keeping their livestock pinned

up when I first filmed Mr tafu Yun and

his colleagues back in 1995 I had no

idea this initiative could achieve such

dramatic

results

[Music]

the effort that people put into

converting their slopes into Terraces

has resulted in a marked increase in

agricultural

productivity the higher yields are

directly related to to the return of

natural vegetation in the surrounding

ecological

[Music]

[Music]

land now when it rains the water no

longer runs straight off the

slopes trapped by the vegetation it

sinks into the ground where it is

retained in the soil taking weeks and

months to gently seep down and irrigate

the fields and Terraces

[Music]

below restoration has occurred over an

area of 35,000 square

km the impact of such an enormous

addition of vegetation goes far beyond

the plateau itself there's been a

significant reduction in the soil

rushing down into the yellow

River as I've been traveling around the

L Plateau I've seen extensive changes

the vegetation cover on the hillsides on

the tops of the hills and down in the

valley Everything Has

Changed it's changed the lives of the

people and in fact the people themselves

have done this because they were the

ones who who changed their behaviors

terraced the fields improve the soils

learn to protect the marginal

areas the changes are not simply on the

hillsides on the plains you can see

green houses that are filled with

vegetables this extends the growing

season it's very high value

produce the abundance and variety of new

produce can be seen in the local markets

follow-up Studies have shown that

incomes have risen

threefold and scientists point to a more

Global

benefit plants through

photosynthesis remove carbon from the

air countering the effect of human

greenhouse gas Emissions on the

climate

in terms of climate change we can say

that the project made a double

contribution firstly the project was

successful in restoring vegetation on a

large

scale so many trees and so much

vegetation grew up and this definitely

helped take carbon out of the

atmosphere secondly because the health

of the Los plateau's ecosystem has been

so much improved

the region will be better able to resist

the negative impacts of climate

[Music]

change as a result of its success the

lessons learned from the lus plateau

Rehabilitation are now being applied all

over China but could such projects work

elsewhere in less centrally controlled

societies with fewer resources in

different

soils

[Music]

Ethiopia perhaps more than any other

country has come to symbolize the

vulnerability of humankind to

environmental

catastrophe this is a country whose

problems have been increased by War and

civil conflict and now human induced

climate change is predicted to make

matters

worse as on the LC plateau centur CES of

subsistence farming practices have

stripped the land of natural

vegetation the dry gullies bear the

scars of flash

floods these gullies are evidence of the

enormous power of runoff during the

rainy

season without vegetation cover on the

hillsides when the rains come the water

doesn't soak into the ground but flows

away in a flood then it's not available

for agriculture during the rest of the

Year this leads to drought and famously

for Ethiopia

famine but just as I've witnessed in

China there is hope that the situation

here can be reversed Yeah that route

could survive no in just 6 years

Professor Lessa Nash and local villagers

have transformed a severely eroded

terrain by planting indigenous trees and

plants almost miraculously a clear

flowing stream has emerged where once

there was a muddy

trickle how is it that it's possible for

you to get the stream to flow throughout

the year it is because of the vegetation

cover which has been regenerating on

this mountain this water is maintained

in the landscape because as soon as rain

falls on the canopy on this vegetation

that

rain then infiltrated ground gradually

into the ground ending up with this

steady flow of this

river water is life without water nobody

can do

anything I'm amazed as short as 5 years

6 years you get clean water like this

provided your card for restoring this

degraded

landscape about 1,000 km further north

in the Village of abraha asaha another

near miraculous phenomenon is

occurring farmers are finding water at

the bottom of their Wells despite the

poor rains this

year the Famine of 1984 struck the

people of this Valley very hard many

migrated many died now the people are

returning the village chairman gabber

Gade remembers well how life used to be

10 years ago I'd say even five years ago

I'll tell you what the situation was it

was absolutely

terrible the Sun the drought the wind

was all dry like the

desert there was a refugee program for

our village so we had a choice leave the

valley or do something

with government support they applied the

same principles as the Chinese setting

land aside for natural vegetation to

return in The Ravines they built small

dams which are now fed by underground

Springs and like Professor leg guess's

stream rain that fell weeks ago now

slowly seeps through the subsoil

replenishing the supply of

water

the roaded land has become fertile it's

changed for the

better in the drought our fruit trees

dried up now they're coming back and

we're growing even more

varieties these are the real benefits

SE we have food security and our

children can go to

school our lives have

improved we no longer need to beg the

government for

Aid thanks to the changes that we've

made even wild animals which disappeared

returning even the

leopards these villagers are now better

able to withstand the impact of climate

change with International assistance

there a achievement could be repeated

across the country the benefits as

Professor Lessa points out would spread

far beyond Ethiopia's

borders the most important issue for

Africa and I consider this uh Africa's

21st burning issue is

restoration no matter what we do we

might be good at rocket rocket uh rocket

science I mean if we nuclear science but

the environment

restoring this huge vast landscape you

know degraded landscape is critical for

Africa particularly for Ethiopia you

know half of Ethiopia is mountain and

this mountain system is degraded and

this degradation of this huge landscape

huge mountain chain of Ethiopia is

critical not only for Ethiopia but also

for the entire region consider Egypt

look at the Sudan where 86% the Nile

flows to these countries how can you

support life in Egypt without restoring

Ethiopia's mountains so this is regional

National and

international environmental degradation

is not only a problem for the dry

regions of Ethiopia it can be just as

devastating for countries like Rwanda

where rainfall is

plentiful

this tiny country is grappling with the

problem of a growing population trying

to eek out a living on a finite amount

of land as in China and Ethiopia over

farming on the hillsides caused serious

erosion and a decline in fertility

forcing poor Farmers to move into

protected areas such as the rugaz

wetlands a wildlife site of

international

importance when Farmers drain this Marsh

to try to grow more food F they not only

damaged an important Wetland ecosystem

they also had a significant impact 3

hours drive away in kagali the capital

city the water that pours from the

marshlands is a vital source of Hydro

power for rwanda's

Capital as the wetlands began to dry out

power stations below couldn't generate

enough

electricity the Rwanda government rented

diesel power generators to make up the

shortfall Dr Rose mukan Ki took me to

see them so what is happening here is

that those

generators we are lenting them from this

company and we have been obliged to lent

them especially when we degraded the

weight land and we lost 20 megaw of

electricity and to run those machines

we're paying $65,000 US dollar a day

$65,000 a day that's multi-millions of

dollars for year it is M million dollar

and as you must might know Rwanda is not

a rich country some of that money has

been borrowed from the bank as from

taxpayers how does this affect the

climate of course those machines they

run the under Diesel and when you burn

diesel you are producing green

house environmentally damaging and more

expensive locals had to pay three times

as much for their

electricity so government policy makers

focused on how to restore the rub gazy

Wetlands if people were the problem they

could also be the

solution we had to take careful look at

what had actually been

happening that damaged uh this

system and therefore had to reverse that

again with Human

Action uh and this is why it is

important to look at how human actions

can destroy or can reverse what has been

destroyed or even

protect U our

environment the government decided to

help the farmers leave the wetlands and

to restore the degraded slopes above

them improving their crop lands and

encouraging trees and shrubs to grow

back capturing the

rain we have been supporting them by U

doing Tes specifically there on the

Hills where they can increase and

improve the

productivity the most important thing is

to have people with you on

[Music]

the wetlands are now recovering great

volumes of water once again Cascade down

to power the hydro

stations carbon-free electricity is

replacing the diesel generators

electricity prices have

stabilized restoring and preserving

natural ecosystems like the razi

Wetlands benefits everyone and so much

more could be

achieved if we had more

involvement by different institutions

coming in to help with available

resources Rwanda could do more much more

and benefit much more but so would other

countries if such a Partnerships and

support were

provided what the rwandans recognized is

that the marshlands are far more

valuable as a natural system providing

water for energy than as Farmland this

principle is the same for the remaining

hillsides and

Ravines what we're seeing here is very

interesting because it's it's a line

between human activity and natural

systems and in the human activity we've

been able to Value the the productivity

from agriculture and give it a a

monetary value but in the natural

systems we haven't been able to Value

the trees the biodiversity the water

that's absorbed into the biomass and

into the

soils and there's another vital service

that trees and plants provide

photosynthesis vegetation reduces the

greenhouse effect by taking carbon

dioxide out of the

atmosphere climate change is better

withstood with trees you know humans no

matter how in intelligent we are no

matter how capable we are with all our

Technologies we are helpless in the face

of climate change we have not yet

properly understood the Miracles

performed by

trees a measure of what restoring nature

can do has been shown here on China's L

Plateau where Farmers have continued to

prosper despite the worst drought in

decades since the beginning of the

project the soil that nurtures their

crops has been accumulating organic

material from plants and animals this

holds the moisture and contains

carbon what's interesting about this is

all the these root materials all this

other stuff this is organic material and

this organic material is mixing together

with the lus the geologic soils here and

it's making a living

soil this is where the moisture resides

yesterday it rained and there's still

moisture in the soil this is where the

nutrients are recycled so that each

generation of Life emerges here and this

is where the carbon is what's

interesting about this they made this

field this is new so they're helping to

sequester

carbon living soils like this retain on

average three times more carbon than the

foliage above the

ground if we were to restore the vast

areas of the planet where we humans have

degraded the soils just think what an

impact we would have in taking carbon

out of the

atmosphere as much as a quarter of the

world's land mass has been ated and much

could be rehabilitated in the way we

have seen on the lose

plateau and we've only just begun to

recognize the real value of natural

Capital surely investing in the recovery

of damaged environments is a

costeffective way of solving many of the

problems we face

today why do we not invest in equal

amount if not more into a shovel ready

technology so to speak which is Nature's

Way of sequestering and storing

carbon it is actually by investing in

our ecological infrastructure and

ecosystems in expanding the ability of

nature to sequester and store carbon

that we have the greatest opportunity to

do something and the wonderful thing is

it's not only carbon sequestration we're

also faced with loss of ecosystems that

will affect our food security our water

security we're losing species on an

unprecedented rate so maintaining

restoring protecting expanding natural

ecosystems has multiple benefits

immediate in terms of climate change but

also fundamental to the future of many

of the services that we simply take for

granted from

nature My Hope Is that the developed

countries those most responsible for

climate change will recognize the

enormous potential of

restoration what we've seen in China in

Africa and around the world is that it's

possible to rehabilitate large-scale

damaged ecos systems if we can transfer

the capital the technology and empower

the local people to restore their own

environment it'll have enormous benefits

restoration can sequester carbon reduce

biodiversity loss mitigate against

flooding drought and famine it can

ensure food security for people who are

now chronic hungry why don't we do this

on a global

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scale

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hey