I continue to be amazed by the amount of plastic we use in our every day lives.
We're a three person family often joined by family members for food each week. Recently we've been on a drive to try and reduce the amount of plastic in our lives. It's actually really difficult. In one week, I counted over 100 items of plastic I recycled. From plastic trays food come in, to the out packaging, From Carrier Bags to plastic bottles, it is everywhere.
I've posted two articles at the end of the piece to highlight the issue.
Today there is a plastic island floating in the mid atlantic which is 2-3 feet deep, the size of Wales (The country), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Atlantic_garbage_patch There is a similar one in the pacific.
What's disturbing is that the facts currently for the UK are that every person in the UK is currently disposing of their body weight of plastic each year, a collective 3.7 million tonnes of the stuff. For us as a family that is the equivalent of filling the entire bottom of our house with the plastic we dispose of. The UK is better than most countries but still only recycles around half it's packaging per year.
Any suggestions of what we can do to reduce our plastic use ?
Here are some very interesting facts about plastic, first from the UK, then the USA
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-42703561
https://blogs.ei.columbia.edu/2012/01/31/what-happens-to-all-that-plastic/
I am really trying to reduce plastic use but as you say it's everywhere. There has been focus on plastic carrier bags but really we need biodegradable packaging and alternative materials in mainstream supplies urgently.. We need to get rid of non biodegradable black bin bags,plastic bin liners food packaging.etc. It needs the big companies to act but every individual to take the need for change seriously and soon.