De onde vem tanto lixo? | MARES LIMPOS #2

This is the Jardim Gramacho dump, it was the largest open pit in Latin America. For more than 30 years, garbage trucks arrived here and dumped waste mainly from Rio de Janeiro and other cities in the region. This dump was closed in 2012, but it is estimated that more than 7,000 metric tons of garbage per day have been dumped there, which even today are still abandoned without proper treatment.

But that’s not the only one. In the metropolitan area of Rio, there are more than 100 clandestine dumps. Most of them are close to the Guanabara Bay.

Much of this waste in one way or another ends up leaking here to Guanabara Bay. This has even rightly worried the athletes who participated in the water events at the Rio 2016 Olympics. But this is not just Rio's problem.

There are many examples all over the world of how badly discarded waste can end up becoming a problem not only for the environment, but also a social and public health issue. Plastics have changed our lives. They came to bring convenience and comfort.

And in some applications they are actually very good. As for example, to reduce the weight of automobiles, so they consume less fuel. The problem is the disposable ones.

Bags, straws, cups and packaging. These are made of one of the most durable materials that exist, to be used for only a few minutes. 35% of all the plastic produced in the world is used for only once in up to 20 minutes.

And then trash, or perhaps sea. Every year, more than 8 million metric tons of plastic are discarded in the oceans. But what can be done to reverse this?

What is the role of industry, government and ourselves, citizens and consumers, to reverse this situation? When you see all these terrible stories about plastic and birds dying and stuff, it's easy to get overwhelmed, because you individually don't really have the power to change the system. However, if we look at social and political movements since the history of time, it is collective action by people in solidarity that makes things change.

And so I think we have to think less individually and more collectively. We have to relearn our political power. Our consumer muscles have gotten very strong.

Our political muscles have gotten very weak. Despite having policies, river basin committees, why the garbage keeps going to sea? Perhaps there is a lack of mobilization of society.

Maybe that's the missing ingredient in the cake. Put a qualified pressure and give options, including the individual. What can I do differently?

Just as companies will have to do. I'll have to do differently. We've looked at the issues of lack of recycling around the world today and we learned that one of the big problems is many packages today are either not recyclable or difficult to recycle, because they're made with different materials or combinations of materials.

Amcor Limited - Present in 43 countries -Produces plastic packaging So by committing to design 100 percent of our packaging to be recyclable or reusable, that can send a signal to industry and also to recyclers that we can start to harmonize designs and get people to start committing to building the infrastructure that's needed to recycle these packages. By 2025 we’ll only put 100 percent recyclable packages into the marketplace. The Coca-Cola Company -Líder Mundial em Bebidas -Dona de 500 marcas Produz + de 3.

500 tipos de bebidas And then we have another 2030 goal which is an aspiration to have 50 percent recycled material in all of our packaging by 2030. We want to use 100 percent renewable energy in our manufacturing sites, and all the materials that we use are either sourced from renewable feedstocks or recycled feedstocks that we have zero waste from our facility's going to landfill, but also we enable consumers to have zero waste. Another goal is that we've committed to double our use of recycled resin, not just any recycled resin but post consumer recycled resin.

And against our baseline of 26,000 tons, we aim to use 52,000 tons per year by 2020. As the industry prepares to make plastic more recyclable, it also wants to produce more and more. In the next 10 years, it's expected that production will rise by 40%.

Of all the plastic produced in the human history, half was made only in the last 13 years. We can not continue to produce, consume and discard the way we do today, or we’ll soon have more plastic than fish in the oceans. Until each one of us assume our roles, there will be no change and we will continue to murder thousands of beings daily, including humans, as a consequence of this whole garbage.

Stopping plastics from going into the ocean requires public awareness on behalf of citizens of the world. It requires governments to come down with legislation that sends very clear signals that we need to start reducing the use of plastics, specifically the plastics that we only use one time. Things like straws, food container material, coffee cups.

We're going to put a fee on some of them, we are gonna ban some of them, I mean we're doing that right now. We're working on a new ordinance so that we can influence what comes into our waste system and we don't have to try to figure out what to do with it. Many countries have already banned.

In Africa, for example, Kenya banned completely the single use plastic and it's working. In Europe, some countries have instituted tax on the plastic and the people stopped using them because they don't like to pay taxes. On the one hand, companies are committed to changing their products so that they can be reusable or recyclable.

But for this they need to go back to the production chain and today only a few countries do large-scale recycling. On the other hand, governments around the world are focused on regulating more and more plastics and banning their use in some cases, but few are committed to making large investments in infrastructure. In fact, both sides need to work together and we, citizens and consumers, are the ones who have to ensure this.

Most of the plastics that end up in the environment today are coming from areas that have no waste management or very poor waste management practices. So, designing plastics to be recyclable is only one small step. Not only to bring governments and civil society together, but also bring them together with business.

Because it will take the three of us, acting together, to restore the health of the ocean. I believe competing on the shelf is absolutely necessary, but we don't need to compete on the infrastructure, or recycling, or recovery. We want to be big and bold.

We want to be leading in the industry, but we can't do this alone, so we'll be working with external partners, whether that's NGOs, governments, community groups, customers that we sell our products through to consumers. What the individual has economically, that can be done individually to make things different, I think both companies and the local governments will have to do too. They will have to understand that garbage can really be an asset in the sense of generating resources, creating jobs, gaining notoriety for having a well-done solid waste management and thereby attracting, for example, tourists of all kinds.

I think that in countries like Brazil, people are very afraid of environmental problems. Whenever environmental management issues are brought to parliament, to the federal government, or to industry, there is a fear that this will result in more problems, in the reduction of the country's wealth building. And it's the other way around.

We need to manage environmental problems well so that the country can generate more wealth and create more jobs through a preserved environment, which is the basis of our economic resources. It is this conviction, this education of the political and industrial decision-maker that we still have to do, but I am confident that we are on the right track to achieve this. And it's not because we don't have a large scale system for selective collection and recycling that we'll not do anything.

Only 1% of the plastic bags are recycled in Brazil. There is no way, the change has to come from us. So if you want to get involved in the Clean Seas campaign, the challenge for the next two weeks is to say no to the plastic bag.

You can use an eco bag, pick up a cardboard box, or use your backpack, the important thing is to do something. I want to see everyone making the challenge and posting with the hashtag mareslimpos! And if you're enjoying the series, give us a like and subscribe for the channel, which is just beginning.

In the next episode, we’ll learn about a movement that started small, as an individual initiative, won the world and today has already spread to several cities. See you there!