DUMPING OUR PLASTIC ADDICTION
AS SOMEONE WHO feels deeply connected to the natural world, it meant a lot to me to be named the ADEX 2017 Ocean Ambassador for the year that ADEX was dedicated to climate change.
This issue affects me deeply; I am passionate about outdoor activities, and return every year to a handful of places that I love. Every Christmas I go skiing in Japan, but in the last few years, I have noticed more grass peeking through the snow, and more frequent storms that make it impossible to hit the slopes. For the annual Spring Festival, I go to Boracay for kiteboarding; the wind is supposed to be stable during the spring. But in the last two years the winds have changed so much as to make kiteboarding impossible. I also just returned from Nepal, where the rainy season has come very early. These kinds of fluctuating weather patterns all indicate that the climate is changing.
But humans aren’t only causing changes to the atmosphere. Every day, our consumerfocused behaviour is having an enormous impact on the oceans in the form of marine debris:
• Annually we generate 300 million tons of plastic waste. More than half of this comes from plastic products that we use just once, for an average of 12 minutes or less.
• Each year eight million tonnes of plastic waste ends up in the ocean. This breaks down into small pieces which eventually become plastic particles.
• The ratio of plastic to plankton in the ocean is
currently about 26:1.
• More than six hundred marine species are directly affected by plastic contamination, including all fish, turtles, countless birds, and sea lions.
• Scientists estimate that more than 90 percent of the
world’s seabirds have plastic in their stomachs.
• Plastic accounts for about 80 percent of marine waste.
• An average of 46,000 pieces of plastic are found in every square kilometre of the seas’ surface. This includes plastic bags, food wrappings, bottles, cigarette butts, car batteries, kitchen appliances, and fishing nets.
None of these are biodegradable, and get broken down into smaller pieces that end up being consumed by marine life.
• It is not only the oceans’ creatures that are being directly killed by plastic in the oceans. Plastic particles in the seafood that humans consume cause cancer, affect the immune system, the metabolism, the digestive system, and cause behavioural disorders.
The obvious, and most basic, solution is to minimise the use of plastic, to reduce the amount that can end up in the sea. Data about garbage on the beach or underwater is also incredibly useful.
PADI has a “Dive Against Debris” course that teaches skills including how to collect data on underwater garbage and remove it properly. Knowing what debris should be removed and how, and what should be left, is important – sometimes debris can become a habitat for critters. Learning how to handle garbage on the seabed is also imperative – some can be dangerous (e.g., rusty metal or old nets and fishing line), or may reduce visibility.
To raise awareness of the seriousness of Hong Kong’s marine debris issue, this May, I shot a programme with a group of artists in which we did an underwater cleanup in Hong Kong’s “Garbage Bay”. It is imperative that more people are aware of this problem.
This place doesn’t belong to me, or to you; this is a shared planet, and, given the scale of the environmental problems it is facing, we desperately need to work together. Experts say that the next 10 years will be the most important in the next 1,000. It is our responsibility to make the changes necessary to protect the natural world.