Every year, a huge amount of plastic, weighing 8 million tons, finds its way into the ocean. To give you an idea, that’s like dumping a truckload of plastic into the sea every single minute.
Once in the ocean, the plastic starts a long and destructive journey. It gets carried by ocean currents across vast distances, reaching even faraway places like Antarctica and the Mariana Trench, which is the deepest part of the ocean. Along its journey, plastic enters ecosystems and causes severe damage to marine life, harming them in ways we can’t fully measure.
Even though plastic pollution is a big problem, the production of plastic keeps going on, which puts the oceans in more danger. Why are oceans so easily affected by plastic pollution, and how can we reduce the amount of plastic that ends up in them?
Where does plastic waste come from?
All over the world, we make more than 300 million tons of plastic waste every year, and that amount is getting higher. But out of all the plastic waste ever made, only 9% has been recycled. The rest has either been burned or thrown away, usually ending up in big holes in the ground called landfills.
One big reason for this is that 50% of the plastic we make is meant to be used only once and then thrown away, like straws, and plastic bags, and water bottles. Because we make so much single-use plastic and throw it away so quickly, it adds a lot of waste to landfills, and that makes more of it escape into the environment.
Issue with plastic
Plastic is everywhere in our daily lives. It’s used to make a lot of things like food containers, clothes, furniture, computers, and cars. This material is very strong and doesn’t break down easily. Depending on the kind of plastic, it can take a few decades to millions of years to break down in a garbage dump.
That means almost all the plastic ever made is still around today, unless it’s burned, which also creates pollution. When plastic gets into the ocean, it can cause problems that last for hundreds of years.
Why does plastic have such a negative impact on the ocean?
The ocean is really big and deep, and it absorbs a lot of pollution from all over the world. Some of the plastic in the ocean comes from ships that accidentally drop their cargo into the water. There are also fishing nets and longlines that are left behind, called ghost gear, which make up about 10% of the plastic waste in the ocean.
Another way the ocean gets polluted is through marine aquaculture, where the foam used to make floating frames for fish cages can end up in the sea and add to the problem.
However, most of the waste that ends up in the water comes from land. Strong weather conditions and strong winds carry the waste to the water, and pollution along the coast is quickly taken away by the tides. The ocean is also the final destination for many rivers, which carry large amounts of garbage and waste from landfills and deposit them into the sea. In fact, only 10 rivers around the world, with eight of them starting in Asia, are responsible for most of the plastic waste that enters the oceans. The Yangtze River in China is the biggest contributor, adding 1.5 million metric tonnes of plastic waste every year.
This is mainly because several countries used to send their plastic waste to China for management. However, China banned the trade in January 2018, even though it used to import almost half of the world’s plastic trash.
When plastic gets into the ocean, the tough environment and constant movement make it break into tiny pieces smaller than 5mm. These small plastic particles are called microplastics. They spread out even more and go deeper into the ocean, reaching more places where animals live. It becomes very difficult to remove them once they’ve gone so far.
Impact of plastic waste on marine life
Every year, hundreds of thousands of sea creatures, like fish and turtles, get trapped in plastic garbage, especially old fishing equipment left behind at sea. This waste restricts their movement, makes it hard for them to find food, and can hurt them. Another problem is that many birds, turtles, fish, and whales mistakenly eat plastic because it looks similar to their natural prey.
The plastic floating in the water also attracts bacteria and algae, making it smell appealing to some sea animals. When these animals eat plastic, it can harm their organs or block their intestines, sometimes leading to death. Additionally, consuming plastic fills up their stomachs but provides no nutrition, so they end up starving.
Microplastics are tiny pieces of plastic that can be easily mistaken for plankton, a type of small organism that many species rely on for food. This means that plastic enters and spreads throughout entire ecosystems. Scientists have found that even the smallest creatures, like coral polyps, regularly eat microplastics.
In addition, plastics soak up harmful substances in the ocean and also have dangerous chemicals in them. Early studies show that when animals eat these polluted particles, it can harm their organs, make them more likely to get sick and affect their ability to have babies.
The severity of the plastic waste problem for marine life
Plastic pollution is a big problem that affects even the most remote places on Earth, like Antarctica and the deep canyons of the Mariana Trench. The ocean currents have gathered a lot of floating plastic into five large swirling areas called gyres. One of these, the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, is three times the size of France. It’s estimated that there are over 5 trillion pieces of plastic in the ocean.
If we keep making plastic at the same rate, by 2050, there could be more plastic in the ocean than fish. Plastic waste directly harms more than 800 species that live near the coast or in the ocean. They can get tangled in it, eat it, or suffer damage to their homes.
Research shows that 90% of seabirds and 52% of all turtles have eaten plastic. Sadly, a million seabirds and 100,000 marine mammals die every year because of plastic waste.
How can humans contribute to saving marine life from plastic waste?
One of the most important things consumers can do is to use less plastic that is only used once, like plastic bags and straws. This kind of plastic contributes a lot to the pollution in the sea. It’s also important to recycle plastic whenever possible.
By joining groups that clean up rivers and beaches, we can help reduce the amount of loose plastic that ends up in the sea.
Another way to make a difference is by supporting campaigns and changes in rules that decrease the production of unnecessary plastic. This has already had big successes in the past, like the ban on tiny plastic beads in toiletries and cosmetics in the United Kingdom, the United States, and other countries.
In China, the government took action and banned thin, single-use bags in 2008, and now they’re working to gradually get rid of more single-use plastics across the whole country by 2025.
Ravi Ranjan