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? Waste claims by Morrison don’t match reality – Australia
Posted on February 1, 2022 by DrRossH in Plastic Limiting RegulationsSource: Waste claims by Morrison don’t match reality – Inside Waste
Scott Morrison claimed his government was reducing the impact of plastic waste in Australia, and in Western Australia. But the reality is the recycling rate for plastic packaging has fallen from 18 per cent to 16 per cent and the reincorporation of recycled plastic in new packaging, which is crucial if we are to move towards a circular economy, has fallen by a third.
“While the Morrison Government has been unwilling to acknowledge that its Australian Packaging Covenant Organisation (APCO) voluntary scheme is ineffective, an Accenture report commissioned by APCO now states that some key 2025 targets will not be met,” said Wilson. “The APCO targets include ensuring that 70 per cent of plastic packaging is recycled by 2025 – whereas the latest data show the rate has fallen from 18 to 16 per cent, and even with improvements over the next three years Accenture projects that Australia will fail to achieve half the target. The target is also to achieve 20 per cent of recycled plastic within new packaging is way off track, which have fallen from four per cent to three per cent, and the Accenture report says this target will not be met by 2025.
There are no real surprises here. The 2025 goals were very unrealistic. The jump from current to required is far too big in such a short time. And the government should have known this and factored in their required actions industry must take. not leave it to a voluntary scheme. Almost all voluntary schemes make great announcement headlines but make no headlines when they fail which the all most inevitably do.
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