Twenty-four trains, nine countries, 13,500 miles. They are the numbers behind the heroic round trip one man took from Southampton in the UK to eastern China.

Roger Tyers, 37, used over $2,500, which was almost twice more than the cost of a return flight, to travel to the Chinese port city Ningbo for academic research in May, 2019. The man spent a month on board 15 trains during the first leg of his round trip. It was the climate crisis, not a love of trains, that drove the sociologist to choose this complicated route over a return flight. He stopped flying when UN climate experts warned that the world had less than 11 years to avoid terrible levels of global warming. Tyers calculated that his train journey to China produced almost 90% less emissions than a return flight.

Tyers is not the only person to avoid air travel in response to climate change. Thousands of people worldwide have publicly promised to stop flying. Activist Maja Rosen launched the “Flight Free” campaign in Sweden with the goal of encouraging 100,000 people not to fly for one year. Although only around 14,000 people signed the online “# flightfree2019” pledge (保证), Rosen, who stopped flying 12 years ago, says that the campaign has made more people worry about the climate crisis and aware of harm of travel by air and motivated them to try new ways of travelling.

According to a survey released in May 2019 by Swedish Railways, 37% of respondents chose to travel by train instead of by plane where possible, compared to 20% at the start of 2018. A spokesperson said: “Rail travel has been boosted due to the worries.” Domestic passenger numbers in July fell by 12% compared to the previous year, according to Swedavia, a company which operates Sweden’s 10 busiest airports.

“The collective pledge helps fight the sense of hopelessness many people feel when it comes to tackling climate change,” Rosen said. “One of the problems is that people feel there’s no point in what you do as an individual. The campaign is about making people aware that if we do this together, we can actually bring changes.”

Recent studies suggest global food production is responsible for one-third of all planet-heating emissions, with the use of animals for meat accounting for twice the pollution of producing plant based foods. Forests that absorb carbon dioxide are cut down for raising animals while fertilisers used for growing their feed are rich in nitrogen (氮), which can contribute to air and water pollution, climate change and ozone depletion (臭氧损耗). Livestock also produces large quantities of methane, a powerful greenhouse gas.

A Dutch city will become the first in the world to ban meat advertisements from public spaces in an effort to reduce consumption and greenhouse gas emissions.

Haarlem, which lies to the west of Amsterdam and has a population of about 160,000, will pass the prohibition from 2024 after meat was added to a list of products thought to contribute to the climate crisis. Ads will not be allowed on Haarlem’s buses, shelters and screens in public spaces, prompting the complaint from the meat sector that local authority is “going too far in telling people what’s best for them”.

Ziggy Klazes, who drafted the proposal banning meat advertising, said she had not known the city would be the world’s first to enforce such a policy when she proposed it. She told a radio channel: “We do not prohibit what people are baking and roasting in their own kitchen; if people wanted to continue eating meat, fine... We can’t tell people there’s a climate crisis and encourage them to buy products that are part of the cause.”

The ban also covers holiday flights, fossil fuels and cars that run on fossil fuels. The ban is delayed until 2024 due to existing contracts with companies that sell the products. Research suggests that to meet the EU target of net zero emissions by 2050, meat consumption must be reduced to 24kg per person per year, compared with the current average of 82kg.

If, for some reason, you had 2,010 empty plastic bottles, what would you do? You’d probably sell them cheaply, right? But Xia Yu collected 2,010 bottles and built a boat with them. As you read this, Xia is, in fact, on a river somewhere in Anhui, slowly going towards his destination: the Expo Garden in Shanghai. 2,010 plastic bottles were to celebrate Expo (世博会) 2010 Shanghai. On the opening day of the Expo, Xia, together with five friends, went on a 1, 500km journey from Xiangtan to the Expo Garden, in spite of the doubt whether they’ll make it. After all, the boat they are on can hardly be called a boat. It cost only 2,000 yuan to build in a month.

What’s keeping Xia going is a major cause behind the trip. “We are examining water pollution through our journey and trying to promote a low-carbon (低碳) lifestyle. Before we started, no one believed we could sail the boat to the Dongting Lake. But we made it.” But as they expected, the journey has not always been smooth. Of the six from Xiangtan, four gave up. As of the press time (到发稿时), only Xia and his friend Huang Ying were on the boat. Huang suffered from a disease when they reached Jiujiang, Jiangxi province, Xia said, “There are so many things that can stop us from making it to Shanghai, like the weather, health, and sometimes swift river water”.

The boat was produced in a factory according to our design, and perhaps it’s not in a very good condition. But, Xia said, “we are wearing life jackets. Some boats passing by offered help”. What is more of a reward for Xia and Huang is that the Yangtze River turned out much cleaner than they had expected. Although Xia and Huang are uncertain about the journey ahead, they are quite happy with what they have already achieved. After all, it’s not the destination that counts. It’s always the course that matters the most.