Can We Afford Not To Act?

A report issued this week and conducted on behalf of the World Wildlife Fund by the University of Newcastle states that the average person globally could be ingesting five grams of microplastics weekly.

Five grams, the report suggests, is the equivalent to the consumption of one credit card.

Without really wanting to detract from the gravity of this situation, yet being unable to suppress the urge, I quipped to Tiki: “I wonder what the rate of interest is on fifty-two cards per year?!”

Flippancy aside, Tiki and I view this situation extremely seriously and while we believe that as there are already an estimated one hundred and fifty million tonnes of plastic and other rubbish in our oceans, and that the proverbial horse in regard to this has already bolted, each morning we, without fail, manage to fill a plastic bag with litter during our daily walk.

In the years that we have been doing this we have only witnessed one other couple bothering to do the same.

We used to exercise two of our dogs at a communally designated area where they could run freely with other people’s breeds. One day, to pass the time, I took a plastic scoop with me and busied myself by picking up the ubiquitous droppings of others’ animals.

Tiki was standing on a rise some distance from me when a gentleman came up to her and started a conversation. When he noticed me in the distance, he remarked in words similar to these: “Look at that bloke down there. He can’t have much in his life!”

“That’s my husband!”, she responded.

Without the utterance of another word, he walked away.

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