China greens massive areas of desert

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In the category of "not everything China does is bad", we have the story of its greening the deserts. By a technique of burying straw in the sand. This is surely a good news story. 

China has grown its forested area from 12% in 1949 to 23% today. Massive W for China.

Contrasts with the sad stories of crumbling cities and ghost malls. Which we see here in Xiamen, a place I've been to often, seen from before it was even a glint in Deng Xiaoping's eye, to when it was flourishing, like my trip there in 2014, to now, tumbleweeds, closed shops, ghost towns, the victims of economic swings and political tussles across the Taiwan Strait.  

Or here at Capital airport, Beijing... which I don't quite buy, since we've been there recently and didn't see it this empty. Still. 

There are similar vids of San Francisco and Oakland in America, with totally empty streets. I think a lot is still due to Covid, the closure of whole economies and keeping people working from home. What a disaster that was.