Paper was invented by a Chinese man called Cai Lun almost 2,000 years ago. It didn't spread to Europe until the year 1100. And four hundred years later, a German discovered that he could make the best paper from trees. After that countries rich in forests, such as Canada Sweden, America, and Finland became the most important ones in paper making.
The common uses for paper include newspapers, magazines and books. But do you know that paper can be used for keeping warm? For example, in Finland, the farmers wear paper boots to keep their feet warm in the snow. And even houses can be insulated (使绝缘) from heat or cold with paper.
However, we have to understand that paper still comes from trees now. If we keep on wasting so much paper, there will not be any trees left on the earth some day in the near future. Every day people throw away about 2,800 tons of paper in the world, which means that we are cutting down nearly 48,000 trees every day. The fact is that it takes more than 10 years for a tree to grow.
As for this problem, we can do many things in daily life. We can use both sides of every piece of paper. We can make useful things out of used paper. We can use china or glass cups instead of paper ones. When shopping, we can use fewer paper bags and reuse them if we have some.
In short, we should keep a balance (平衡) between using paper and protecting trees, and do it now before it is too late.
