Visitors make snowmen beside a pool at a hot spring in Hangzhou, in China's eastern Zhejiang province on January 26, 2018. China's central and eastern regions have been hit by heavy snowfalls in recent days, causing disruptions to flight and train schedules. (Photo by AFP Photo/China Stringer Network)

A dramatic rise in owning exotic pets in China is fuelling global demand for threatened species. The growing trade in alligators, snakes, monkeys, crocodiles and spiders is directly linked to species loss in some of the world’s most threatened ecosystems. Here: A fennec fox (Vulpes zerda) is groomed in a pet store in central Beijing. Native to the Sahara in North Africa, the species became a popular pet after being depicted as a character in Disney’s 2016 animated movie Zootopia. Individuals can cost between $2,000–$3,000. (Photo by Sean Gallagher/The Guardian)

Two women in traditional kimonos wear face masks to help curb the spread of the coronavirus as they visit the Sensoji temple in Tokyo on Friday, August 7, 2020. (Photo by Hiro Komae/AP Photo)

A statue of a woman made out of glass and rubble that resulted from the Beirut port mega explosion August 04, is placed opposite to the site of the blast in the Lebanese capital's harbour to mark the one year anniversary of the beginning of the anti-government protest movement across the country on October 20, 2020. Hundreds marched in Beirut on the weekend to mark the first anniversary of a non-sectarian protest movement that has rocked the political elite but has yet to achieve its goal of sweeping reform. (Photo by Joseph Eid/AFP Photo)

Twenty-year-old women draped in traditional kimonos gather for their “Coming-of-Age Day” ceremony at the Tokyo Disneyland in Urayasu, eastern suburb of Tokyo on January 13, 2020. (Photo by Kazuhiro Nogi/AFP Photo)

Men wear masks as they sit in the metro in Prague, Czech Republic, 17 March 2020. According to media reports, the Czech government decided to impose a two-week quarantine in the country on the evening of 15 March, and ban all international travel from 16 March 2020. Currently 383 cases of the coronavirus SARS-CoV-2, which causes the Covid-19 disease, have been officially confirmed in Czech Republic. (Photo by Martin Divisek/EPA/EFE)

Mortuary workers walk past a Christmas tree as they remove the body of an elderly person who died of COVID-19 from a nursing home in downtown Barcelona, Spain, Wednesday, December 23, 2020. (Photo by Emilio Morenatti/AP Photo)

A girl plays in a waterlogged street following a heavy monsoon rainfall in Mumbai on June 9, 2021. (Photo by Sujit Jaiswal/AFP Photo)