Take Action To Solve Problems

林鋒

清新的空氣，清澈的河流，綠油油的大地，藍(lán)藍(lán)的天空……這一切是多么令人向往，讓我們伸出雙手，一起保護(hù)這美麗的地球！

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（約翰內(nèi)斯堡）， South Africa. He noticed a haze（薄霧） 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 （強(qiáng)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(tǒng)）. Based on historical and real-time data（實(shí)時數(shù)據(jù)）， the system can accurately（精確地）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;經(jīng)營） 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（專業(yè)知識）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.”