Blue Economy Webinar: Tackling Ocean Plastic Waste in the Seas of East Asia

FREE Webinar brought to us by PEMSEA!!!
<3 p="">Blue Economy Webinar: Tackling Ocean Plastic Waste in the Seas of East Asia
(60 minutes worth our time)

Learn from Dr. Jenna Jambeck as she talks about addressing the challenge of ocean plastic waste:
- Estimated plastic waste flows and current status of policies
- The challenge and opportunity of ocean plastic waste
- How the region fits into the global context of this issue
- Recommended actions for stemming the tide of ocean plastic

Notes from the webinar:

Plastics basically have a very short term use but they exist in the environment practically forever!
^ This alone requires of us urgent action!

Fact: Our trashes are ending up in seas and oceans.

Most common impacts of plastic in sea creatures:
Plastics fill their belly but provide no nutrition and plastics lacerate their internal organs. Sea creatures get entangled into larger plastic debris where they are trapped for the rest of their lives.

Global Plastic Production Estimates
1950: 2M metric tons
2017: 8.3B metric tons
2050 (projection): 34B metric tons --- VERY ALARMING!

Plastics once they enter the ocean - can be transported around the world

9% Recycled Plastics
12% Incinerated Plastics
79% Accumulated in landfills

SOLUTIONS presented by Dr. Jambeck:
1. Reduce plastic production (industry-led) coupled with reduction of plastic demand (Consumers)
2. Innovate materials and product design (Green engineering, circular economy)
3. Reduce waste generation (Consumers, Sharing/ collaborative economy)
4. Improve global waste management (Context-sensitive solid waste management infrastructure)
5. Improve litter capture and clean-up

No proper segregation makes recycling much more challenging.

Small choices seem like not much (like bringing your own water bottle every single day).. but it actually adds to a lot (the number of plastic cups you didn't have to use) over time.

Solid waste management is a shared responsibility of policy-makers/government leaders, manufacturers and consumers.

Added notes:

Microbeads in personal cleansers and other beauty products are actually polluting our oceans!! They're microplastics!! Ughh!

Garments made of synthetic material shed microplastic fibers that eventually escape into the oceans.

Oxo-degradable is NOT biodegradable! Causes more harm than good.

There is a depolymerization process to "decompose" plastics -- though it is not a very popular method to deal with low-value plastics because it is an costly process.


Blue Economy Webinar Series: Tackling Ocean Plastic Waste in the Seas of East Asia from PEMSEA on Vimeo.