Eco-friendly replacement products for single-use plastic are appearing everywhere. But have you heard of edible (可食性的) straws?Now EQUO, a new eco-friendly company in Vietnam has come up with a natural edible solution to plastic or paper straws. The edible straws are completely plastic free, nontoxic, chemical free, and 100 percent biodegradable (可生物降解的) according to a company press release.

“It’s well-known that plastic straws are harmful to the environment. Most of the 500 million used every day in America end up in oceans where they pollute water and harm marine life. Currently, over eight billion straws create pollute to the world’s beaches,” said Marina Tran-Vu in the press release. “Although there are some plastic and paper straw alternatives on the market, most are environmentally harmful, but we were also unsatisfied with the quality and lasting of paper straws.”

All of the materials are locally from regions that support sustainable farming according to the company’s website and they struggle to have zero-net influence by “using the power of mother nature”. The name of the company was created by combining “ECO” — meaning environmentally friendly — with “STATUS QUO” — meaning the existent state. EQU stands for creating products that have minimal influence on the environment. The company was first shown on Kickstarter on May 18 and hit their funding goal in only 30 days.

Many counties are banning single-use plastics. The EU banned 10 single-use plastic products including straws that will take effect in 2021. Other items that will no longer be made of plastic include cutlery (餐具), and balloon sticks. These 10 items make up a large percentage of ocean waste that harms marine life.

So do your part, use biodegradable cutlery — you can carry your own edible straws, and reusable water or coffee cups. These small items can contribute to buffering plastic waste.

My sister Alice and I have been trying to get people to stop dropping cigarette butts (烟头) for seven years. One day, we were walking in our hometown and saw hundreds of cigarette butts on the ground. They made the town look so ugly that we decided to start a group to make people stop dropping butts. We called it “No Butts About It”.

At first, we drew pictures with “The Earth is not your ashtray (烟灰缸)” written on them. We put the pictures around our hometown — in parks, on beaches, and along roads. We wanted to make people understand that dropping butts hurts the environment. Most smokers don’t think that dropping butts hurts the Earth. But it does, and all rubbish does!

Later, we wrote to companies and asked them for money to help us. We used the money to buy ashtrays and gave them to smokers. We wanted smokers to carry the ashtrays with them so they didn’t have to drop butts.

At the moment, we are trying to get cigarette companies to put an ashtray in each pack of cigarettes. Some companies want to do it. Many people have started to join our group since it began. Today there are 45 other “No Butts About It” groups in America.

Now there are even groups in England, Australia, and India! Many newspapers have written about my sister and me over the last seven years. And we have won many prizes for what we do. But we are not interested in prizes. We just want to make the Earth a better and cleaner place for animals, plants and people. One day, it will be.

In the forest of New Mexico, scientists are carrying two ten-day-old Mexican wolf pups (幼崽) riding in a backpack, searching for a Mexican wolf pair that has just given birth to six pups.【小题1】

Mexican wolves were extinct in the USA by the 1970s, but there was a plan to bring them back. The first step was to trap five wild Mexican wolves and breed them with two caged ones. In 1998, the first caged-born adult Mexican wolves were released into forests. 【小题2】If animals have to pair up with family members, then their pups will have unhealthy genes, making them sick.

【小题3】 Let wild wolves adopt caged-born pups-that’s how these two pups end up in backpacks. While the adult wolves are out hunting, the scientists gently place the pups with their new brothers and sisters. They rub the caged-born and wild pups together, ever letting them pee (小便) on each other to mix their smells! 【小题4】 This result makes the scientists optimistic about the plan.

The idea is that the caged pups will grow up and breed with wild wolves. 【小题5】 Thanks to this ongoing work, 250 wild Mexican wolves wander Arizona and New Mexico today.