Marine Litter Vital Graphics

DRIVERS

nearly all traditional materials and they offer qualities unknown in naturally occurring materials. Plastic products and technologies provide huge benefits in every aspect of life, to the point where life without them is almost unthinkable. Many sectors of the economy use plastics, including food and water packaging, a myriad of consumer products like textiles and clothing, electrical and electronic devices, life-saving advanced medical equipment and reliable and durable construction materials (Andrady and Neal, 2009; Thompson et al., 2009). Plastic is convenient as a manufacturing material due to its durability, flexibility, strength, low density, impermeability to a wide range of chemical substances, and high thermal and electrical resistance. But it is also one of the most pervasive and challenging types of litter in terms of its impacts and management once it reaches the marine environment, where it is persistent and widely dispersed in the open ocean. A growing human population, with expectations of a higher standard of living and generally rising consumption patterns, is concentrated in urban areas across the globe. Our current lifestyle entails increasing consumption of products intended for single use. Plastic manufacturing and service industries are responding to the market’s demands by providing low weight packaging and single-use products without plans for end of life management. Plastic packaging is considered one of the main sources of waste. In Europe, plastic production comes in three broad categories: about 40 per cent for single-use disposable applications, such as food packaging, agricultural films and disposable consumer items; 20 per cent for long- lasting infrastructure such as pipes, cable coatings and structural materials; and 40 per cent for durable consumer applications with an intermediate lifespan, such as electronic goods, furniture, and vehicles (Plastics Europe, 2015). In the US and Canada, 34 per cent of plastic production was for single-use items in 2014 (American Chemistry Council, 2015). In China in 2010, the equivalent figure was 33 per cent (Velis, 2014). However, when we look at the plastic found in waste streams, packaging accounted for 62 per cent of the plastic in Europe in 2012 (Consultic, 2013). This confirms that plastic intended for a single-use product is the main source of plastic waste, followed by waste derived from intermediate lifespan goods such as electronics, electrical equipment and vehicles (Hopewell et al., 2009).

Global plastic production...

1 800

Million tonnes, 2013

1 500

Commonwealth of Independent States

EU 50

7

Japan

11

49

62

North America

18

41

China

Middle East and Africa

12

Asia (excluding China and Japan)

Latin America

1 000

800

600

...and future trends

Million tonnes

400

200

1950

1970

1990

2010

2030

2050

Source: Ryan, A Brief History of Marine Litter Research, in M. Bergmann, L. Gutow, M. Klages (Eds.), Marine Anthropogenic Litter, Berlin Springer, 2015; Plastics Europe

Marine plastic litter, like other waste or pollution problems, is really linked to market failure. In simple terms, the price of plastic products does not reflect the true cost of disposal. The cost of recycling and disposal are not borne by the producer or consumer, but by society (Newman et al., 2015). This flaw in our system allows for the production and consumption of large amounts of plastic at a very low “symbolic” price. Waste management is done “out of sight” from the consumer, hindering awareness of the actual cost of a product throughout its life. Sustainable long-term solutions to stop increasing amounts of plastic waste from leaking into the environment require changes to our consumption and production patterns. This is a complex task. In order to succeed, campaigns targeting behaviour change need to

Marine Litter Vital Graphics

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