By Bisola Adeyemo
Plastic accumulating in oceans and on the beaches has become a global crisis as billions of pounds of plastic can be found in swirling convergences that make up about 40 percent of the world’s ocean surfaces.
Around the world, one million plastic bottles are purchased every minute, while up to five trillion plastic bags are used worldwide every year.
Plastics and microplastics are now ubiquitous in the natural environment as they are becoming part of the Earth’s fossil record and a marker of the Anthropocene.
According to the UN Environment Programme (UNEP), 300 million tonnes of plastic is produced every year, and not all of it is recycled. To put that into perspective, that’s equivalent to the weight of the entire human population.
Some facts about our plastic use and ocean pollution.
1) Only 9% of all plastic produced is recycled.
2) A whopping 2 million plastic bags are used every minute worldwide.
3) Single-use plastics are illegal in some parts of the world.
4)Every minute of every day a truckload of plastic is dumped into the ocean.
5) 73% of beach litter worldwide is plastic.
6) One million plastic bottles are bought every minute.
7) There could be more plastic than fish in the ocean by 2050.
8) Up to 95% of plastic polluting oceans is carried by 10 rivers.
9) 99% of seabirds will be eating plastic by 2050.
10) The average person eats 70,000 microplastics each year.
11) The average time that a plastic bag is used is just 12 minutes.
12) Over the past 50 years, world plastic production has doubled.
