Efforts were underway in Bangladesh to deliver food and drinking water to millions of people struggling after a heavy rain led to flooding, which hit a quarter of the country. There are around 3.5 million Bangladeshis at risk of river flooding every year according to a 2015 report by the World Bank.

On Wednesday, at least 17 of the country’s 64 districts (地区), mostly in the northern and north-eastern Sylhet, were suffering from the natural disaster. Government officials said at least 36 people had been killed and about 4.5 million people stuck so far. The floods also caused damage to agriculture (农业), electricity, and clean water supply.

Sylhet is among the worst affected, with several areas without electricity. “Many people are in great need of food and drinking water,” said Enam Ahmed, 45, living in the worst-hit Sunmaganj district. “There is water everywhere but no drinking water. Flood shelters are filled with people but they are not getting enough food,” he said.

The situation in Bangladesh has been worsened by rain water falling down from the surrounding hills of India’s Meghalaya state, which received more than 970 mm (38 inches) of rain on Sunday, according to a government report.

“The flood situation in the three Barak valley districts continues to be very serious. Army rescuers have evacuated thousands of trapped people to safe places. 14 rescue teams with more than 70 boats and over 400 men have been pressed into action in the heavily flooded districts,” said a local flood control official. About 5.5 million people have been displaced, about 3.7 million of whom are staying in government-run temporary (临时的) shelters on higher ground.

Locals in the flood-affected areas said they had never seen such serious floods before.

American Harvey Sutton, a 5-year-old boy, just finished walking the whole length of the Appalachian Trail (路线), one of the longest footpaths in the world. Harvey is one of the youngest people ever to walk the trail. He and his parents completed the trip in 209 days.

Harvey climbed over tall rocks and got to watch wild animals. “The rock climbs were really hard but fun. We were not bored.” said Harvey. His parents tried hard to him happy and excited. His father said meeting and talking with other hikers along the way prevented boredom.

Harvey was 4 years old when he and his parents began their walk in January. He turned 5 before the family completed the trip earlier this month in Maine. But the youngest of all to finish the trip may be Juniper Netteberg. The little girl finished walking the footpath at age 4 with her parents last October.

The long hiking may seem like an extreme activity for a child, but Dr. Laura Blaisdell sees no harm. She is a children’s doctor and medical adviser to the American Camp Association. Dr. Blaisdell said children are strong enough for the experience if parents attend to their child’s usual social and emotional development.

Harvey’s, trip earned admiration from another hiker, Dale Sanders. He is the oldest person to hike the footpath, which he did at age 82. “It’s going to change his life forever, and his parents’ life, too. The kid went through some hardships, but don’t we all? Hardships make us stronger,” said Sanders, now 86. “That kid is going to smile through life.”

We are all aware of the effect greenhouse gas emissions is having on our planet and the efforts needed to tackle climate change. Most of us are doing our bit to minimize our impact on the environment, but despite our collective effort, are we doing enough to achieve net zero by 2050?

Net zero means not adding to the amount of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. Many countries are doing their bit by changing how they generate and use power, thereby cutting carbon dioxide output. And they announced what further steps they were going to take at the recent COP26 summit in Glasgow.

In the UK, the government has been setting out its plans to achieve net zero by 2050. It's recently announced an end date for the sale of gas boilers (燃气锅炉)，which are used for heating homes. The idea is to replace them with heat pumps. It’s offering homeowners grants (拨款) of up to £5,000 to get them installed Another initiative in the UK is a big push towards electric vehicles. There are to be financial incentives (激励) for car manufacturers, and more charging points are to be installed in streets. And there’s to be a ban on the sale of new petrol and diesel (柴油) cars by 2030.

But not all emissions can be reduced to zero, so those remaining will have to be compensated for, or offset (抵消). One way to do this is to plant thousands of trees，which are good at absorbing carbon dioxide. The UK government has pledged (保证) to plant 30,000 hectares of trees a year by 2025. There are other ideas too, but what's certain is this will cost money. The CBI's Tom Thackray told the BBC that ''those costs have to be weighed up against the cost of inaction (不作为).”

Whether the UK, or anyone else，reaches net zero remains to be seen. And there’s some doubt about how this can be accurately measured anyway. But it's generally recognized that a global effort is needed to tackle climate change. Therefore, net zero targets only make sense if every other country is moving in the same direction.