THE PLASTIC PROBLEM

After Discovering "Plastic free July" in 2018, I started to delve a little further into the plastic problem and I was shocked by what I found.

Plastic, as many of us know, is versatile, long lasting, strong and relatively inexpensive to produce. You can see why it’s appealing to use in many industries however it is due to these attributes that we are facing the plastic problem around the world. Plastic ultimately becomes waste with staying power.

Published only recently on the National Geographic website, Laura Parker, reiterates her findings from ‘The new study’, published in the peer-reviewed journal Science Advances.

“Of the 8.3 billion metric tons that has been produced, 6.3 billion metric tons has become plastic waste. Of that, only nine percent has been recycled. The vast majority—79 percent—is accumulating in landfills or sloughing off in the natural environment as litter. Meaning: at some point, much of it ends up in the oceans, the final sink.”

A programme that was a really hard watch and I’m not ashamed to say had me in tears was ‘Drowning in Plastic’, a BBC production presented by Liz Bonnin. If you’re not aware of the plastic problem, which many people are not, I would recommend you watch it. It will open your eyes to what's happening with our plastic waste and hopefully give you the motivation to start your plastic free journey.