Kelp Gull Project: African Marine Debris Summit

African Marine Debris Summit. Waves of Change: African Lessons to Inspire Local Action.

Waste is wealth. A statement made by Honourable Deputy Minister for Environmental Affairs, Rejoice Mabudafhasi during her opening speech which was reiterated throughout the 2 day summit. Beaches are windows into marine litter. And we’re being given insight into a dire situation. There is hope, but as Dr. Seuss writes in The Lorax ‘Unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot, Nothing is going to get better. It's not’. Through innovative ideas, waste can be made into wealth, and things can get better.

Reduce, Reuse, Recycle, the 3 R’s. There are various childrens’ songs to remember the 3 R’s, and various advertising and awareness campaigns. But this has evolved, we must do more than reduce, reuse and recycle. We must rethink our strategies for rubbish management, recycling and minimising environmental impact; redesign products with recycling in mind; refuse one-use plastics such as straws, barrier bags and shopping bags; respect the environment and ultimately be a responsible plastics user, and with our rubbish in general.

There were delegates from Germany, Australia, Belgium, Seychelles, Côte d’Ivoire, Cameroon, Nigeria, Kenya and South Africa. It was wonderfully diverse, with so many topics covered, I was so inspired and learnt so much! But there was a general feeling that the time allocated for the summit was far too short, sessions went overtime, there was just too much to discuss and debate, too many questions to be asked and answered, too many voices that needed to be heard. Topics covered included: the current state of the marine debris in our oceans and the effects thereof; the current actions that are underway to mitigate the effects of marine debris and litter in general; what microplastics and POPs (persistent organic pollutants) are and the concerns surrounding these and we heard all about the lifecycle of plastics and the urgent need for recycling, as well as the urgent need for the capacity for plastic recycling.

Our Saturday fieldtrip to Robben Island was cancelled due to ferry maintenance, and so we had our fieldtrip at a local beach, Milnerton. Which got rained out. But for the short time of sunshine that we had, I learnt a lot about sampling marine debris, which can be applied to the rubbish sampling I want to do on my gull colonies and that will save me some time and give me better, more specific data.

I left the summit with mixed feelings, the state of the world with regards to litter, both terrestrial and marine, is a shocking concern. The world that we are custodians of, and will pass on to future generations, is not one we can be proud of. As in the animation movie Wall-E, where the world is full rubbish and the humans have left for a better life on a spaceship in the sky, which seemed so entertaining, could be a deplorable reality. The world is filling up with rubbish, landfills quickly being packed to capacity, oceans with raft-like collections of rubbish floating around. And who is to blame?

The circle of blame goes around and around. Who is to blame? Something that came out of the summit is that we all have our part to play, plastic producers need to contain all pellet spills, make recyclable plastics, reduce the plastics they produce, consumers need to recycle, refuse one-use plastics among others. There is an obligation on both sides for producers and consumers to consider the impacts of their actions.

I will take responsibility for my actions. I am recycling everything I can, taking my own bags for my shopping, not using straws, buying fresh produce from a market, and making an effort to spread the news, encourage everyone else to recycle and do their bit.

Other people are doing much more in their efforts to raise awareness about the importance of recycling. Ray Chaplin is one such person doing the Orange River Project. A very inspiring story of how he is extreme riverboarding down the whole of the Orange River and stopping at schools along the way promoting recycling and a clean environment.

We can do so much, there is hope.