China and Germany

Available for over a year

Pascale Harter presents stories from Jill McGivering in China and Stephen Evans in Germany. China’s economic rise has created megacities out of places that only a generation ago were sleepy villages. One of the most astounding changes has happened in Shenzhen. Thirty years ago it was a small fishing town just across the border from Hong Kong. Today it is a sprawling city, home to up to 14 million people. Jill McGivering visited before the economic boom, and she recently returned to talk to a family whose fortunes have mirrored those of China as a whole. In some European cities, huge numbers of people have decided to take up a rather quaint mode of transport – the bicycle. The impact of two-wheel pedal power is evident in the middle of Copenhagen and Amsterdam, and even bigger cities like London and Paris which have introduced cheap bike-share schemes. But the European city that arguably has the most bike-positive policies is Berlin, and BBC correspondent Stephen Evans has hopped on his bike to find out why the German capital is so cycle-friendly.