We know that decades of dumping has created entire islands of plastic in the oceans. With no initiatives forthcoming from governments and big business, we as ordinary citizens feel angered and powerless. Thankfully, organisations such as 4Ocean are stepping up, seizing the initiative and taking it upon themselves to begin the task of cleaning our seas.
An Environmental Disaster on our Shores
The evidence is plain to see when you sail out to the deep blue, but also in the form of the melee of garbage that washes up on the beaches not just of industrial nations but even the remotest tropical islands. The damage done to the natural ecosystem is now being matched by that impairing industries such as tourism and fishing, with more and more sea creatures dying off as they are caught in nets or trapped in floating shoals of plastic detritus.
Solutions
Fortunately, not everyone is sitting back and doing nothing. There are people not content with depending upon those in positions of authority. Among them are pioneers like Alex Schulze and Andrew Cooper, who became so appalled with the state of things after a surf trip to Bali that they decided to take direct action themselves.
To put it into context, these two young graduates from Florida are no strangers to the sea – no well-intended urban liberals with little knowledge of their subject matter. Both have been sailing, swimming, surfing and diving from a young age, and their passion for the seas took them to exotic shores such as Costa Rica, the Bahamas and Indonesia. There, they encountered local fishermen thrashing about amid floating plastic and trash.
Each trip things seemed to get worse, and today many fishing communities around the world struggle to catch enough to support growing families. The two friends were saddened at the thought of people dependent on the catch landing only plastic, no fish – and then it hit them. Quite by accident, they had stumbled upon a business model that may just roll back the damage and save our oceans: a business model built around fishing for plastic.
Do your bit
The bracelets are therefore a sign of solidarity and support for people who are cleaning the oceans for us. It’s a momentous task, but for every bracelet sold, a pound (almost half a kilo) of plastic rubble is taken out of the seas and oceans. The bracelets themselves are made from 100% recycled plastic water bottles and recycled glass.
With over 180 employees and a large number of volunteers worldwide, 4Ocean has captains and clean-up crews working around the clock. It’s a momentous job, but they are getting it going and also offer a range of other environmentally focused products for sale that are aimed at reducing the further growth of the plastic mountains and islands. These include recycled flasks that counter the need for single-use plastic bottles, a full clean-up kit as used by the volunteers, and a monthly subscription that supports the work on an on-going basis.
The organisation gets the process going, but also helps local fishermen to supplement their income through the collection and sale of plastic from recycling. However, initiatives such as this need to grow in scope and number, so that larger parts of the globe are covered and we can begin to slow, stop and eventually roll back the onslaught of plastic and other junk in our seas. So visit the www.4ocean.com website and see if you would like to support their work or even volunteer to help out in person.
WORDS MICHEL CRUZ PHOTOGRAPHY COURTESY OF 4OCEAN
For further information on the conversation of our oceans visit https://www.idiveblue.com/ocean-plastics-environmental-disaster/