Sam Gruet
👤 SpeakerAppearances Over Time
Podcast Appearances
If it looks like a plastic and it feels like a plastic and it acts like a plastic,
but it doesn't biodegrade like a plastic, then why is it not being... Everywhere, yeah.
You're listening to Business Daily from the BBC World Service.
Today, can the global economy go plastic free?
We're heading to the northeast corner of South America.
On a beach in Ecuador, volunteers sort through bags of plastic waste piled high on the sand.
Alongside them, vultures, large and pterodactyl-like, pick through the rubbish.
Much of it carried downstream from Ecuador's many rivers.
Andrea Lima is a director at Ixion.
They're a company introducing technology to Ecuador's rivers to stop plastic pollution.
Upstream from beaches clogged with waste, a yellow barrier floats in the San Pedro River.
But not all of that plastic can be recycled.
Some of it is just too damaged.
Because Ixion aren't just collecting plastic.
90% of which contain plastics.
Today, forms like polyester, nylon and acrylic make up about 60% of the material used in clothing around the world, according to the UN Environment Programme.
Much of it, an estimated 92 million tonnes per year, ends up as waste in landfill or being incinerated.
While the European Environment Agency estimates that between 2 and 500,000 tonnes of microplastic fibres from textiles enter the marine environment each year.
It happens when they're worn, washed or thrown away.