Experts grapple with scale of plastic pollution in oceans • FRANCE 24 English

On this beach in Namibia, these men are battling a huge male seal. But they’re not hunting the animal. They’re trying to help. Oh boy. Oh boy. Plastic packaging strap. One of our main entanglement products we’re dealing with. Most of the seals we catch are firstear pups, and they anything they find in the water, they will play with. They swim through it, they play with it, and eventually they get stuck in it. This group has saved over 5,000 seals in the past 6 years, but it’s a whack-a-ole situation in the face of millions of tons of plastic waste that end up in the ocean every year. Obviously, first priority is to help these animals. Secondly, is like how can we stop this from being such a recurring problem? Yet, these seals have a big advantage over other marine species as they often come to shore to rest and could get help from humans. But many others, including birds, sea turtles, and whales, die after getting tungled up and infected or ingesting toxic substance. Among the threats facing them, microlastics released when larger plastic debris degrades over time or when synthetic fabric like polyester is washed. Plastic when it gets in the ocean, when you’re looking down the line, is almost impossible to deal with. If you’re thinking about something like an a microplastic or a nanoplastic, the same size is smaller than a plankton, how can you possibly clean that up out of the ocean? Scientists say the solution to the problem must start at the production end of plastic. But the production volume only keeps increasing from 2 million tons annually in 1950 to more than 430 million today. Up to 23 million tons of plastic waste leak into aquatic ecosystems every year. A number that could jump 50% by 2040 without urgent action.

As 185 nations engage in talks on reaching a global treaty to curb plastic pollution, the increasingly unmanageable scale of plastic waste littering oceans and threatening the wildlife within them leaves experts concerned about the feasibility of an adequate solution.

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12 comments

  1. Millions of tons, just in the ocean, yet the internet is polluted with smug sociopaths who ridicule recycling because there's no money in it for them or their corporate sponsors.

  2. So when they changed the plastic mfg rules to superthin maybe 20 years ago, blamo the microplastics were born- created! Go ask who really made these "required" changes… then you will know who and why this was done. Why don't you report on that portion?????????!!!!!

  7. First came the story of climate change and the universal control of global temperature. Then, controlling and reducing carbon emissions that led to the financial brilliance of carbon trading. Now banks and oil companies have collectively written that off. So, a new fraud. That of plastic pollution has been created. New environmental control companies will soon be created and IPOed benefiting the scammers.

  8. No landfill so plastic won’t be end up in Ocean!
    Recycle plastics, glass & tires to produce new products!
    No waste in environment, a circular economy to boost prosperity!
    God bless All & the World! 🙏❤❤❤🙏

  10. Oil companies block efforts to stop the production of even more plastic. We all have a spoonful of plastic in our brain already. These companies are pure evil. We need to revolt against them!

Comments are closed.