Sustainability Conversations ... Rethink this Godawful mess

"And Man created the plastic bag and the tin and aluminum can and the cellophane wrapper and the paper plate, and this was good because Man could then take his automobile and buy all his food in one place and He could save that which was good to eat in the refrigerator and throw away that which had no further use. And soon the earth was covered with plastic bags and aluminum cans and paper plates and disposable bottles and there was nowhere to sit down or walk, and Man shook his head and cried: 

 "Look at this Godawful mess." 
 Author: Art Buchwald
 

Plastic now pollutes every corner of Earth 

From supermarket bags to CDs, man-made waste has contaminated the entire globe, and become a marker of a new geological epoch.

The humble plastic bag and plastic drink container play a far greater role in changing the planet than has been realised. “Just consider the fish in the sea,” he said. “A vast proportion of them now have plastic in them. They think it is food and eat it, just as seabirds feed plastic to their chicks. Then some of it is released as excrement and ends up sinking on to the seabed. The planet is slowly being covered in plastic.”
- Source: The Guardian here

Polystyrene foam remains intact for about 500 years

Historians typically define eras by the type of material civilisations leave behind: the stone age, the bronze age, the iron age. The archeologists of the future may well look back on the modern era as the plastic age, our legacy piling up in landfill, clogging up rivers, floating about the oceans, and choking or poisoning wildlife – and the humans who eat the wildlife – for centuries to come

Polystyrene foam remains intact for about 500 years before breaking down into chemicals that linger far longer than that. Source:The Guardian here

About 8 million tons of Plastic enters the ocean every year

Trash accumulates in 5 ocean garbage patches, the largest one is between Hawaii and California. Read about a solution here

Plastic Bag dubbed South Africa's National Flower
 MORE than R1.2 billion collected from taxes on plastic bags over the past 13 years has not gone to creating jobs for youth in the green industry as it was meant to.

Instead the money has gone to the Department of Environmental Affairs' (DEA) coffers to fund Working for Water and Working on Fire, said the department's spokesperson, Albie Modise.

Read more here

 Our Sustainability Hero of the week is Hayley Mclellan, environmental campaigner at the Two Oceans Aquarium in Cape Town. We chat to Hayley about their Rethink the Bag and Plastic Free July campaigns.

 

Keitu Gwangwa & Pierre du Toit host the iStart2 Show on Thursdays at 17h30. Radio Today broadcasts on 1485 MW (AM) in greater Johannesburg and countrywide on ‪#‎DStv‬ audio channel 869. 

Radio Today also streams globally on www.1485.org.za. 

Something to think about ...

Make your voice heard by joining our campaign to ban the plastic bag in South Africa and convince our politicians (by emailing your ward councillor - remember, it's an election year!)