A Few Facts About Plastic

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  Did you know that plastic bottles and containers that get thrown into rivers and lakes pose a serious threat to the environment as they can take up to a thousand years to decompose? They can cause irreparable damage to the entire eco-system they end up in.
• Did you know that fish and birds are most likely to ingest pieces of plastic that get thrown into different bodies of water? In rare cases the pieces pass through their intestinal tracts and do little damage, but in most cases the animals die from suffocation. The saddest thing is that many of the fish and other wildlife that accidentally eat pieces of plastic don’t die instantly. They often suffer a horrible slow death from starvation because the pieces block their intestines.
• WSPA is an international non-profit NGO that recently issued a report filled with estimates of plastic-induced wildlife deaths. The numbers are staggering, and go as high as 70% of all deaths.
• The United Nations issued a warning saying that for every square kilometer of sea water there are about 18,000 pieces of plastic debris floating. There’s so much debris in the water, that an artificial island made entirely of garbage was made. It’s called the Great Pacific Garbage Reef and it’s doing immeasurable amounts of damage to both the climate and the wildlife.
  
  
  
  
  
• The UNEP (The United Nations Environment Program) constantly warns people about the dangers of plastic pollution and often hold workshops and conferences to help spread awareness of this issue.
• Of all the waste that’s made on Earth in one year, between 60% and 80% ends up in water. And no body of water is an exception here – oceans, seas, rivers, lakes and even small creeks get polluted the same.
• You could say that everything that goes around – comes around! The Journal of Scientific Reports recently published a study that says that plastic waste and other synthetic fibers that are disposed of in water end up as parts of the food chain in oceans. That means that a big part of all seafood that reaches your grocery stores has probably fed on plastic at some point.
• Your actions as an individual play a great part in larger conservation efforts. You can contribute to saving the environment by recycling all the plastic you have and buy. You’ll be helping your local recycling facilities stay in business and creating a demand for recycled products by buying them. No effort is small enough to make a difference when it comes to recycling.
• If you’re unable to recycle as much as you’d want, there are always things you could do to minimize your production of garbage. You can reuse things instead of throwing them away. Repurposing used or broken household items as decorations is as fun and creative as it is environmentally-friendly.