What is at stake?

The ocean represents 70% of the Earth's surface, 50% of the air we breathe and 82% of the world's biomass. However, every year, around 10 million tonnes of plastic enter the ocean and reach the ocean gyres, and over 640,000 tonnes of nets, lines and traps are lost, discarded and thrown back into the sea.

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Plastic marine pollution:

• Traps and poisons marine life.

• Infiltrates the food chain.

• Disrupts the entire ecosystem, especially its ability to absorb CO2.

• Disrupts ocean climate control.

• Promotes the proliferation of pathogens and microbes highly resistant to antibiotics, possible causes of future pandemics.

 

The annual economic cost of plastic in the oceans is estimated at between 6 and 19 billion dollars. These costs are due to its impact on tourism, fishing and aquaculture, and to the clean-up costs incurred by governments and local communities.

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Added to this are the health consequences on the food chain, which will weigh increasingly heavily on the future of humanity, with over 600 million people dependent on fishing and aquaculture.

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Eliminating these plastic shrouds drifting on the high seas is no easy task. The high toxicity inherent in the composition of plastic, combined with the proliferation of microbes, bacteria and heavy metals accumulated over the years spent at sea, not to mention the profusion of invasive species that like to cling to it, makes any recycling operation very costly, even dangerous.