Take Action To Solve Problems

林锋

清新的空气，清澈的河流，绿油油的大地，蓝蓝的天空……这一切是多么令人向往，让我们伸出双手，一起保护这美丽的地球！

Are there any environmental problems in your city？ What causes them？ Have you ever taken action on your own to solve problems？ Did you seek out（找出） help from others along the way？

One winter morning， Tapiwa Chiwewe was driving to work in Johnnesburg（约翰内斯堡）， South Africa. He noticed a haze（薄雾） hanging over the city and it didn’t take long for him to realize that it was an enormous（巨大的）cloud of air pollution.

At that moment， Chiwewe had an urge （强烈的欲望） to do something about it， but didn’t know what. He was a computer engineer and knew little about environmental science. He first did research on air pollution and found that it was the world’s biggest environmental health risk. He decided to work on it in a cooperative（合作的）way. He talked to scientists， officials， and engineers who helped him develop a deeper understanding of the situation， as well as an idea to improve it.

Through years of work， Chiwewe and his coworkers（同事） from  South Africa and China created an online air quality decision support system（系統）. Based on historical and real-time data（实时数据）， the system can accurately（精确地）predict air pollution and air quality， which can help people make better decision about their daily movements， as well as help officials better manage（管理;经营） their operations.

Chiwewe learned an important lesson- “a lesson we all need to take into heart if we are to work towards a better future. Even if you’re not an expert in a particular（特定的）field， your outside expertise（专业知识）may hold the key to solving problems within that field，” he said. What if Chiwewe hadn’t bothered to research the problem and do something about it？ What if he had just hoped that someone， somewhere， was taking care of the matter？

As Chiwewe said， “ Why not just go ahead and deal with the problem as well as you can， in your own way？ You may be pleasantly surprised.”