This rich man is obsessed with having a clean city

So, you’re wondering why the hell should a billionaire be picking up trash from the streets? Was he convicted to community service? Is it by picking up rubbish that he made his fortune? No.

Zhong Congrong is picking other people's rubbish upp from the streets of Chongqing because he wants to - and because he can.

Zhong Congrong has been doing this every day for the past three years, after an inspiring encounter with a retired 70-year-old professor who was doing the same on a beach in Hainan back in 2015.

Zhong is the perfect example of paying it forward, and that each one of us has a chance to make a difference, it just requires action. For him, it doesn’t matter if you’re poor or rich, young or old, your education or cultural background. Positive energy and efforts are contagious.

China has more than 1 billion people and faces enormous environmental issues, with some areas severely polluted. Just air pollution alone is estimated to cause almost two million deaths each year, according to the Berkeley Earth organization. Can you imagine the Great Wall of China being replaced by an Awful Wall of Plastic? In some areas of the Great Wall, this is already happening.

Planet Earth has its limits on how much it can stand, and nothing is infinite. With Zhong’s actions hopefully more people will start to realise that the right thing to do – if not picking up trash from the floor – is at least not to throw it on the streets.

At time of writing, the Air Quality Index (AQI) in Beijing is 169. In other words, it is considered unhealthy.

We need more people like Zhong to take action into their own hands and spread the word. He started doing this three years ago, and he already said he is not going to stop until he is 80 years old and can hardly move.