How many people today grab a takeaway coffee cup from the local cafe to drink on the go? We don’t know, but the number must be enormous.. Most every one of the above have a plastic top that will last 100s of years. Some cafes still use plastic cups that last a similar time. Is 10 minutes of coffee worth 100s of years of trash?
These items can be seen littering our gutters and on our streets all over the place. If they were all cardboard, they would still be littered, but they would, at least, be gone in a short time.
They do not need to be made of plastic.
On the way home from the gym last week, a distance of about 1 km (1/2 mile), I counted the items of plastic litter on the curb as I walked. In that short distance I counted 63 pieces of plastic litter. Plastic drink bottles, bottle tops, candy wrappers, plastic film, polystyrene fragments etc. That seemed to be a lot to me. I guess it is a generational thing. Our parents would have been horrified to see that amount, whereas it seems to go unnoticed by our youth of today. In another 20 years how many pieces will there be on this stretch, -- 200? What will today’s youth think of that new amount then when they are older? Will their children be so readily accepting of a higher amount of litter? Regina council moves forward with recycling fee – Canada
Posted on July 20, 2012 by DrRossH in Plastic Waste NewsRegina council moves forward with recycling fee | Solid Waste & Recycling Magazine.
Charlene is quite correct. Extended producer responsibility is what we need to be talking about in addition to a consumer incentive fee to make consumers ‘want’ to recycle, rather than being not caring and just throw everything away to trash.
For too long now manufacturers have been manufacturing plastic without a regard for any of its disposal issues. Back in the 80’s we didn’t know any better and thought we could keep on doing what we were doing for ever. Now that higher plastic production levels are upon us, with more population to consume more plastic we have a huge plastic waste problem.
Manufacturers are responsible for a large part of this and those manufacturing decisions made in the 80’a need to be revised to the current more sustainable approach to manufacturing and resource use.
Consumers equally have a large responsibility to minimise their use of disposable plastic items, and to ensure their plastic waste is all recycled and not dumped to trash. This will involve community groups organising themselves to set up collections, liaisons with council groups to facilitate this.
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