Marine Plastics - The Facts

By Hannah Evans

Plastic debris washed up on Manda Island, Kenya | © Hannah Evans

Plastics are a hot topic these days. There are more and more articles, videos and campaigns encouraging businesses and individuals to ditch single-use. But what is often left out is the how behind the what - we all know discarded plastic is bad and harming our environment, but we don’t always know how exactly.

Today, we wish to arm you with the facts to further support the argument that single-use plastics don’t make sense and that we all should be working towards a single-use plastic-free and full circular economy where there is no such thing as waste.

Where did our plastic world begin?

It was in 1907 that the first fully synthetic plastic was created. At this point, plastic production was expensive and unusual. But this all changed during World War One. The US plastic industry expanded by 300% during this period and continued to grow long after the war ended.

Plastic was advertised as a vision of the future. A material 100% handmade that could be moulded into any shape or form, the uses were endless.

However, in the US people’s love of plastic began to wean in the late 1970s as plastic pollution became a common sight on roadsides and in the environment. Thus beginning the ruthless campaign of the plastic industry to point to the consumer as the polluter and shift the responsibility of disposal and recycling from the producer onto the individual.

That trend is continuing today. Plastic production continues to grow year on year and our dependence on single-use plastics becomes more and more cemented in daily life.

Though things are beginning to change today as the finger of responsibility is being turned to point back at producers to reduce plastic waste and find new ways to recycle and eliminate unnecessary single-use plastics.

What about plastic use and production today?

Since 1950 8.3 billion metric tons of plastic has been created worldwide. While according to National Geographic only 9% of that has ever been recycled. Today we produce 300 million tons of plastic per year, and half of that is designed to be used only once.

If we continue on the current trajectory in terms of plastic production and managed waste it is estimated that 12,000 Mt of plastic waste will be in landfills or in the natural environment by 2050.

And now, plastic is everywhere, including in us

A study by World Wildlife Fund for Nature found that worldwide every person is ingesting 5 grams of plastic a week. That is the equivalent of a credit card, every single week. We are ingesting these microplastics through the air we breathe, the water we drink and the food we eat!

“We’ve found plastic everywhere we’ve ever looked. It’s in the Arctic and the Antarctic and in the middle of the Pacific. It’s in the Pyrenees and in the Rockies. It’s settling out of the air. It’s raining down on us.” - John Hocevar, Greenpeace

Shredded PET at the Takataka Heroes site | © Hannah Evans

The material that was once hailed for its durability and longevity is now being decried for those same reasons. Due to the chemical makeup of plastics, they will never entirely decompose. Instead, they will only become smaller and smaller pieces of the same material causing harm to the environment at all levels.

So we know there’s plastic inside of us, but where’s the rest?

The vast majority of plastic that has been produced is now accumulating in landfills or running off into our open spaces, rivers, lakes and eventually, oceans. Recent research by The Ocean Cleanup found that 80% of marine plastics come from 1000 of the world's rivers.

This research is important to note as previously the source of marine plastics had been focussed on coastal communities. However, this research illustrates the importance of a concerted effort towards waste management and reduction of plastic pollution across the globe.

Furthermore, the marine plastics we have become accustomed to seeing floating on the surface actually only accounts for 1% of all ocean plastics. Because of the abundance of floating plastics one might assume that all plastic floats. However, as many types of plastics are denser than water, they sink to the ocean floors once they are broken up and no longer containing air to aid buoyancy.

The material used to make up plastic bottles - PET - is one such type of plastic. Worldwide we buy approximately 1 million plastic bottles a minute, only 14% of these bottles consumed are recycled.

That’s 860,000 plastic bottles being disposed of every minute to sink to the depths of our ocean floors.

During the Flipflopi Lake Victoria Expedition, the first surface to deepwater analysis of microplastic presence in Lake Victoria was conducted. As we don’t yet know the impact of global efforts of reducing plastic pollution, it’s important we continue to research. By doing this research, it allows us to quantify and illustrate what efforts are working and that we still must do more!

Single-use plastic items on the ocean floor

What this means for our oceans

8 million tonnes of plastic enter our oceans each year. If we continue at this rate, by 2050 the ocean will contain more plastic than fish, ton for ton. According to the United Nations, 800 species worldwide are affected by marine plastic.

Species can become entangled, suffocated or bloated and die from eating marine plastics. A 2016 study found that the reason why so many marine species eat plastic is that it actually smells like food. Marine plastics are a perfect material for algae to grow on, zooplankton to whales mistakenly smell out these marine plastics thinking they’re full of nutrients.

This compounded with the fact that much ocean debris looks like food leads to more and more plastic being eaten. This is why it’s not surprising when we find dead sperm whales with nearly 100kg of plastics in their guts.

These events will only become more and more common and less and less newsworthy

Marine pollution and plastics are also responsible in part for the dying off of coral reefs worldwide. Plastic debris can carry invasive marine organisms and bacteria that can disrupt delicate ecosystems. In fact, corals that come into contact with marine plastics have an 89% higher chance of contracting disease.

Coral reefs provide havens for 1000s of species acting as nurseries and breeding areas, act as a natural buffer between the oceans and coastlines and are vital for the oceans ability to sequester carbon dioxide. With this in mind they’re vital for a healthy ocean ecosystem and without them we’d be looking at mass destruction of oceans and underwater life.

A freshly hatched turtle on Takwa Beach, Kenya | © Hannah Evans

And the problems continue on our beaches

As ocean currents wash plastic debris onto our beaches, those pristine sands become clogged up with plastics. Even on uninhabited remote island beaches, up to 3kgs of plastic per square metre has been found.

This build-up of plastic also causes the ground temperature to rise. This can negatively affect beach-dwelling ectotherms such as crabs and sea turtles who are vital for healthy beach habitats.

A rise of plastic debris also leads to less desire from tourism to visit previously pristine beaches. As millions worldwide depend on tourism for income, communities that aren’t necessarily responsible for the huge build-up of ocean debris can be the ones that suffer the most.

Why we need to act now

Ultimately, solutions need to be created and sought to eliminate plastic waste entirely. These innovations must come at all levels. From community-led waste management to the research and development of plastic alternatives by the big producers.

This is why action to tackle waste management - at all levels - needs to encourage and commended. We need to come together to stem the flow of plastic entering our oceans before it’s too late.

There are reasons to be hopeful

New small-scale community-led waste management initiatives are forming globally. When these initiatives are supported and managed sustainably, it’s not only our environment that benefits but people too. Millions of sustainable jobs can be created globally, from waste pickers to those finding innovative ways to recycle and reduce plastic use.

A recycled plastic plank from a circular economy in Mwanza, Tanzania | © Katharina Elleke

A circular economy must emerge to...

Improve community health by reducing outbreaks of mosquito and water-borne diseases, reduce levels of asthma and other respiratory illnesses from the burning of waste.
Regenerate ocean economies by reducing the amount of plastic entering them thus improving livelihoods and economies from tourism to fishermen that rely on the ocean.
Reduce the harmful effects of climate change as we reduce burning waste and biomass which accounts for 40% of global black carbon levels.
Reduce individual economy’s overall greenhouse gas emissions by 10-15% by properly managing waste.
Offer a sustainable regenerative option to global economies suffering from the negative impact of the COVID-19 pandemic allowing economies to build back greener as they begin to recover.

While there are many reasons to become despondent towards the problems of plastic pollution, it really all doesn’t have to be bad. If we collectively act now then we can begin to turn the tide on plastics.

Businesses and individuals are becoming more and more conscious of their own plastic choices, offering plastic alternatives and reducing their overall plastic footprint while more turn to and support local solutions to waste management.

Countries meanwhile are becoming aware of the negative effects of poor waste management and taking first steps towards better policies towards plastics.

Worldwide, variations of plastic bans are becoming more common. Canada is phasing out the use of six single-use plastic items set to be banned in 2022. This year, the European Union’s ban on items such as single-use plastic cutlery and styrofoam cups comes into effect. While Australia is working towards phasing out the use of single-use plastics entirely by 2025.

Within the East Africa Community, Uganda has become only the second landlocked country to sign on to UNEPs Clean Seas Pledge and indicated they will begin to enforce the law banning plastic bags. Kenya meanwhile has been strengthening their Extended Producer Responsibility Act to force plastic producers to do more to support recycling and search out alternatives.

Becoming aware of the problem is the first step towards taking responsibility and actively pursuing alternatives to plastic waste. Be that refusing a straw, lobbying your local government ministers or starting your own waste management initiative. There is something big and small we can all do to reduce global plastic pollution.

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