The plague of plastic – we can all act
Plastic is killing our oceans. If you saw Sir David Attenborough’s final Blue Planet 2 programme over Christmas, you’ll be aware that is his considered view after the documentary maker visited oceans around the world.
What’s really worrying is that plastic is ending up in truly remote places, far removed from human habitation. Even sub-Antarctic islands like South Georgia are seeing birds and fish die after becoming entrapped in plastic or eating it.
Meanwhile, here in the South Pacific remote Henderson Island (200 kilometres from Pitcairn) has millions of pieces of rubbish, mostly plastic, littering its beaches. Little wonder some South Pacific nations are starting to ban plastic bags and bottles. It’s estimated about 30 million tonnes of plastic end up in the world’s oceans every year.
It will not come as any surprise to any Sounds user to say that we are not immune to the plague of plastic.
Last month, marine farmers from across the top of the South did their annual Big Day Out beach clean-up. I was out in my boat with some Marine Farming Association volunteers in Tory Channel. We collected more than half a woolsack of debris, most of it plastic; bottles, rope, strapping, fish bait bags and other debris was collected.
Of course, some of that is marine farm debris. We acknowledge it’s our duty as people operating in public space to do all we can to minimise that debris entering the water and clean up any that does.
More than a dozen industry vessels from mussel, salmon and oyster-rearing companies took part in Big Day Out across the Marlborough Sounds, Tasman and Golden Bays. One New Zealand King Salmon team did a clean-up at Waikawa marina collecting
We acknowledge it’s our duty as people operating in public space to do all we can to minimise that debris entering the water and clean up any that does.
more than 40 kilograms of debris.
The annual Big Day Out is just one of the many beach clean ups our boats and crews do throughout the year. We have meanwhile raised the bar with new environmental standards and clear expectations to boat crews that nothing should be dropped in the water. Boats have scoops to retrieve anything that does fall. We are also trialling initiatives such as bio-degradable rope. As a result, over the years marine farm debris has fallen from around twothirds to about a third of what we collect on Big Day Out.
Sadly, I can’t say there’s been a corresponding drop in other debris; in fact, I’d say it’s increasing, especially plastic.
As Sir David Attenborough observed, debris, including plastic, is brought by tides and currents into particular locations. While some Tory Channel beaches we visited were relatively clean, others were dotted with lots of debris. Plastic items were the main culprits. Similar results are seen in other parts of the Sounds and across the top of the South.
As well as earning my living from the Sounds and other marine areas, I’ve grown up holidaying in the family bach and now I’m taking my children out regularly to enjoy this slice of paradise. I want them and their children to enjoy the Sounds environment as much as I was able to do at their age.
If the plastics challenge is not addressed, fish in the Sounds will end up eating plastic particles. The risks go even wider. A recent Guardian newspaper article reported that billions of people globally are drinking water contaminated by plastic particles, with 83 per cent of samples worldwide found to be polluted.
So our family, for one, have started the New Year resolving to end our use of plastic bags at the supermarket and to re-use plastic containers as much as possible.
I’ll be talking to our marine farmers to see what more that we can do to reduce our use of plastic. We will also look at coordinating with other interested parties to increase the scope of the Big Day Out this year.
We will never be able to eliminate plastic – for one thing, some of it’s all but indestructible but if every Sounds user did their bit, I’d hope we can at least keep the plastic plague at bay.