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Nairobi, KenyaIt didn’t take long after the recent United Nations environmental assembly in Kenya ended for environmentalists to sharply rebuke the United States for allegedly derailing global ambitions to prevent plastic debris from flowing into the oceans.
“The tyranny of the minority,” their statement declared as environmentalists denounced the Americans for what they said was slowing progress on marine plastics by diluting a resolution calling for phasing out single-use plastic by 2025 and blocking an effort to craft a legally binding treaty on plastic debris.
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“I would not say the U.S. is making itself irrelevant,” says David Azoulay, a Geneva-based lawyer for the Center for International Environmental Law, who observed the negotiations. “But it is true that the U.S. is setting itself further apart, as it did with the withdrawal from the Paris accord, from addressing the critical challenges of our generation. The whole world is addressing the plastic challenge at its roots. The EU is doing it, India is doing it. The world is moving forward.”The Americans sought to define marine debris as an issue solved exclusively by waste management, said Hugo-Maria Schally, the European Union’s lead negotiator on marine plastics, in an interview, while “virtually everybody else in the room was focused on the idea that there is a problem with production and the use of single-use plastic.”
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One reason other nations are also seeking reductions in single-use plastics is the growing unease that even creation of the most comprehensive waste disposal systems may not be enough to keep up with the accelerating pace of plastics manufacturing. The plastics industry has grown so rapidly that half the plastic on Earth has been made since 2005, and production is expected to double in the next two decades. Disposable plastic products account for 40 percent of that production and are largely blamed for the plastic mess that’s been made of the seas.
...So far, 127 countries have adopted regulations regarding plastic bags, according to UN tallies as of July 2018. Twenty-seven countries have adopted bans on other single-use products, including plates, cups, cutlery, or straws.
India, home to 1.3 billion people and the world’s second most-populated nation, continues preparations to abolish all single-use plastic by 2022 in a plan announced last year that may be the world’s most ambitious undertaking.
See also the Flipflopi dhow
Ben Morison’s epiphany came early one morning as he set out for a swim on Kenya’s Indian Ocean coast. The Kenyan tour operator counted 13 pieces of plastic, including bottles and flip flops, as he walked to the sea. With a jolt, he realized how degraded the coastline he loved – and marketed as a dream destination – had become. He had to act.
“It’s all too easy to look to the left or the right and wait for somebody else to do something but I thought, ‘What can I do that could help bring this to light, and be fun and cheerful?’,” he says.
The answer became the Flipflopi project: an ambitious plan to build a traditional dhow from recycled plastic and sail it along the East African coast to spread the message that our reliance on single-use plastics is wasteful and destructive.
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The Flipflopi is the latest chapter in Kenya’s push to become a global leader in dealing with plastic pollution. In August 2017, the country introduced the world’s toughest ban on plastic bags with anyone producing, selling or using a plastic bag risking imprisonment of up to four years or fines of $40,000.The Kenyan ban has inspired other African countries – including Uganda, Tanzania, Burundi and South Sudan – to consider following suit. Rwanda already banned plastic bags in 2008.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 11 2019, @12:55AM (23 children)
I just think of these people as "meddlers" who cause one problem and then need to meddle more to solve the problem they just caused, etc.
Want to stop widespread waste? Stop with the inflationary currencies that force everyone into constant "growth". That is all it takes.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 11 2019, @01:08AM (8 children)
I had one of these meddlers knock on my door this week. Many morons in my state is trying to ban single use plastics through legislation, because they believe that is how you solve problems. I should ask them how did the compulsory recycling work, wasn't that supposed to have fixed the problem decades ago? or did the law of unintended circumstances kick in and it actually created the great garbage patch as instead of landfilling the stuff it got peddled around until some third-world shithole took the money and released it into the ocean. These ass-clowns think they can solve anything, where in fact they cannot solve a single fucking thing.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 11 2019, @01:18AM (2 children)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 11 2019, @01:59AM (1 child)
I thought it was known to be the Chinese.
(Score: 2) by stretch611 on Thursday April 11 2019, @06:57AM
Not plastics... those are burned. Only locally produced chemical toxins are placed in their waterways.
Now with 5 covid vaccine shots/boosters altering my DNA :P
(Score: 5, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 11 2019, @01:35AM (1 child)
"Many morons in my state is trying to ban single use plastics through legislation"
Watch out now, your house is made of glass. The problem was that recycling legislation did not plan for off-shoring the process. I guess we shouldn't have left a big loophole that would allow waste handlers to skirt around the law.
I know! Let's use the "free market" to solve our problems! I'm sure no one will take the easy route of burning everything, clandestinely dumping it all into the ocean, or burying everything in the local landfill with some kickbacks to the dump.
Yup, small government will solve everything! Humans are naturally clean animals that do what is best for the planet!
(Score: 2, Insightful) by khallow on Thursday April 11 2019, @12:52PM
NEWS FLASH: the people passing that sort of law routinely don't plan for a lot of stuff. They're the reason, the phrase "unintended consequences" gets used so much these days.
(Score: 5, Informative) by Runaway1956 on Thursday April 11 2019, @01:51AM (2 children)
Actually, the garbage patch started well before that offshoring nonsense.
We live in an environment, in which water is all the time rinsing the land clean. 24/7/365, water falls out of the sky, runs across the land, carrying bits of this and that, into the rivers, and then into the oceans. Water evaporates from the ocean, blows across the land, then condenses and falls again, to once again wash away little bits here, there, and everywhere.
The dead zones in the Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic existed long, long before recycling was offshored. We can't blame those zones on India.
A wasteful society whose economy is dependent on creating waste can expect unpleasant results of being so wasteful. Garbage patch is one of the examples.
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Thursday April 11 2019, @06:55PM (1 child)
The US already does a reasonably good job of keeping plastics out of the ocean. Nearly all municipalities (and all industry) are required to have stormwater controls that remove that stuff before it gets into the rivers and stream.
The problem the well-informed are trying to address with e.g. plastic bag bans is that they clog up those very same stormwater controls and it's very costly to maintain them when they're constantly getting clogged.
The smart environmentalists are actually trying to save your tax money.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Friday April 12 2019, @01:32AM
How effective are those "controls" at removing microplastics? How effective, really, are they at stopping bits and pieces of plastic bottles and bags that the sun has degraded? We know the plastic is out there in the ocean, and we know that Americans are routinely dropping plastic all over this nation. Walk down any highway, and look down into the ditches. They are full of plastic items. When the road maintenance crews mow the grass, those mowers chop that plastic up into ever smaller bits, which the sun then degrades further.
Sorry, I have little faith in those systems. They may prevent large items getting through, but all those little bitty pieces just keep on going. And, of course, they ONLY stop the big bits that actually pass through the collection points.
(Score: 4, Informative) by SpockLogic on Thursday April 11 2019, @01:09AM (5 children)
USA fuck yeah and fuck the rest of the world.
It'a Trump compensating for his mushroom.
Overreacting is one thing, sticking your head up your ass hoping the problem goes away is another - edIII
(Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 11 2019, @01:25AM
Why should the US take part in people creating busywork for themselves?
Shut down the ponzi scheme and back the dollar with gold/silver/bitcoin or whatever cannot be generated without limit by politicians.
You will see all these environmental problems far reduced as people are rewarded for saving for the future again.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Thursday April 11 2019, @02:54PM (2 children)
Is it "the US" that is opposed to single use plastics? Or is it Trump that is opposed?
I doubt a single use condom exists that would properly fit on the misshapen tiny mushroom.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 2) by ilsa on Thursday April 11 2019, @03:21PM (1 child)
Thank you. I really needed that image rolling around in my head first thing in the morning. :P
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 11 2019, @10:13PM
... and she's seen 'em all.
(Score: 2) by realDonaldTrump on Sunday April 14 2019, @05:19AM
I guarantee you there's no problem. I guarantee it.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 11 2019, @01:40AM (1 child)
The solution is even simpler: Stop electing people from law professions into leading positions.
(Score: 2) by realDonaldTrump on Sunday April 14 2019, @05:17AM
Thank you for your loyal support!
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 11 2019, @03:57AM (5 children)
Capitalism itself seems force us into unending growth and imperialism [marxists.org]. When the growth starts to end, then we tend to get fascism until enough wealth is blown to kingdom come so that the "unending" growth can start again.
Doesn't necessarily need inflationary currency, factional reserve banking, or what have you. Tho fractional reserve accelerates the theft of wealth from the working class.
(Score: 0, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 11 2019, @04:54AM
No, it is very clear and understood by anyone who bothers to look.
If you create money by giving out loans that need to be repaid with interest you need ever more money to be created to pay that interest. It is just a massive ponzi scheme.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday April 11 2019, @01:39PM (2 children)
It only seems that way to people who don't have a clue how economies work.
As to the whining about growth, we need to grow whether or not that growth is infinite. It's not like everyone is enjoying a developed world lifestyle and lives as long as they'd like. Nor have we figured out all the mysteries of the universe and colonized as much of the Solar System as we'd like.
So given that, wouldn't it make sense to use an economic system that handles growth well? Like Capitalism?
Sorry, there was a lot more going wrong with those countries than merely economic downturns.
You don't need hammers to pound nails either. Hunks of rock will do. But if you want to do it well, you need a tool that works well. Sorry those tools work well. As to the theft, you mention - it's contracts willingly entered into by said working class. That makes it not theft by definition.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 11 2019, @02:52PM (1 child)
Tyranny is not a contract that was entered into willingly. The debt is a lie.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday April 11 2019, @11:01PM
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 11 2019, @03:28PM
Shut up russia:
From wikipedia;
Marxist economics was assessed as lacking relevance in 1988 by Robert M. Solow, who criticized the New Palgrave Dictionary of Economics for over-sampling articles on Marxist themes, giving a "false impression of the state of play" in the economics profession. Solow stated that "Marx was an important and influential thinker, and Marxism has been a doctrine with intellectual and practical influence. The fact is, however, that most serious English-speaking economists regard Marxist economics as an irrelevant dead end."[26]
There is no such thing you're just here stirring shit and dragging discussion back 50 years so that we can't discuss real issues.