The plastic nightmare

Diego Horcajada, June 2018

The plastic crisis is finally receiving the attention it deserves.

To help us understand the size fo the problem, lets put things into perpective: considering the projected consumption growth, it is expected that by 2050 oceans will contain more plastics than fish (by weight).

Can you picture this out? Honestly I cannot, and I do not want either. It is just disgusting.

Fortunately we start to see some policy changes, more countries are putting a date on the ban on single use plastics such as suppermarket plastic bags and straws in restaurants and cafeterias. The European Commission came out early this year with the first-ever Europe wide strategy on plastics.

Did you know that as of January this year, China effectively banned imports of plastic recyclables from other countries? This change represents a major policy shift, considering that  in 2016, China took 51 percent of the 15 million tons of plastic recyclables in trade globally. We have to see in the Chinese government decision an opportunity to adopt new strategies, and a change of mindset: We canot keep the with the traditional produce/use/dispose mindset otherwise the food chain in the oceans will just collapse.

I invite you to get informed about the topic, and I propose you a convenient way to do it: just spear 100 min of your time to watch the documentary film A Plastic Ocean, you can access it through Netflix  or iTunes

I hope we all find the motivation to consume and use plastic responsibly, to request industry, retailers and policy makers the implementation of the necessary changes that will accelerate the solutions.

I would be glad to ready your comments

Diego Horcajada