Across Germany, an alarming number of trees are falling ill and dying. Over the past two years 180,000 hectares of forest have disappeared, linked to extreme weather events and the proliferation of an aggressively spreading bark beetle.

This week Down to Earth is in southern Spain, amidst the world's largest greenhouse complex. In just a few years, Spain has become the undisputed leader of organic farming in Europe. But is intensive organic farming a real solution for the planet? We find out more.

Paris is not a place where you'd expect to find rows of neatly planted fruit and vegetables, but urban farming is flourishing in the French capital. The Down to Earth team takes a closer look.

During World War I, 1.5 billion bombshells were fired on a single frontline extending 700 kilometres from the North Sea to the French border with Switzerland. A third of them never exploded and many of them remain buried. A century later, France is still in an unfinished battle to erase these enduring scars. It could take more than 300 years to rid the soil of this toxic waste, as forgotten shells continue to pose a silent threat to humans and the environment.

Biodegradable packaging is often pitched as the environmentally-friendly solution the world has been waiting for. However, so-called greener plastics don't necessarily break down as easily as marketers would have us believe. To make matters worse, biodegradable plastic can't be recycled. So if it doesn't readily disappear into nature and can't be reused, should we consider the "biodegradable" label a well-intentioned but misleading promise? The Down to Earth team investigates.

You may not know it, but your trash probably travels more than you do. The moment a plastic container ends up in your recycling bin marks the beginning of a long trip halfway across the world.

When you live in Europe, the air you breathe, the water you drink and the meat or fish you eat are all controlled in Brussels. That could no longer be the case for the United Kingdom. Due to Brexit, the country is now entering uncharted territory, and the environment could become collateral damage. We find out more in this episode of Down to Earth.

They are cheaper and boast all the characteristics of their mined counterparts. In recent years, lab-grown diamonds have become increasingly popular among millennials, who are more in tune with environmental issues. We take a closer look.

If flower bouquets are seemingly perfect, that's because they can contain dozens of toxic chemicals, much more than vegetables. We take a closer look.

You may not have noticed, but there are millions of pieces of garbage above your head - in space. Orbiting the Earth are nearly 30,000 objects the size of a fist, 750,000 just one centimetre large and 150 million smaller than a millimetre.