Our perceptions of the world are often warped by news coverage that is overwhelmingly negative, which fuels our own negativity bias and leads us to believe that everything is going poorly. It is easy to forget that the world is often a pleasant place, so here are five good things that happened this year:
- There are more pandas in the world than there were a decade ago, which should make even the most pessimistic of us smile. According to China’s Giant National Panda Survey, wild panda populations have surged 16.8% in the past decade. Conservation efforts have proven fruitful as there are now an estimated 1,864 wild pandas in the world today, ensuring a future for the once endangered species.
- 2016 is on track to have the lowest child mortality rate ever recorded. In 1800, 43.3% of children globally died before reaching the age of five. By 1920, that number had fallen to 23.9%. In 2000, it stood at 7.59%. This year, the number is expected to end at around 4.25%, something we should all celebrate.
- Over 800 hostages were rescued from the terrorist organization Boko Haram. Boko Haram operates in Nigeria and was made famous by kidnapping 300 school girls and holding them hostage, sparking international outrage. In March of this year, the Nigerian army was able to liberate over 800 hostages still in their possession and greatly weaken the standing of this terrorist organization.
- On July 11th, volunteers in India broke the world record for planting the most trees in one day. More than 800,000 volunteers worked to plant nearly 49.3 million trees across the Indian landscape, ensuring the long term viability of wildlife in India.
- Finally, this year saw the end to one of the longest ongoing civil wars in recent memory. An agreement was reached this year between a guerrilla organization known as FARC and the Columbian government to end their 52-year civil war. The original peace deal was rejected by Columbian voters but was reworked and eventually passed in November, ending the half-century standing civil war, and bringing peace to the long fractured country.
