Amsterdam, 18 August 2018 – Since some days Waste2Wear textile products are for sale in Dutch shops. These products are made of waste plastic by Indian home weavers. Part of the waste plastic are bottles from the sea. This has multiple advantages: home weavers receive better pay, stray bottles are taken from the sea and there is more attention for the plastic soup.
The Waste2Wear website provides background information that indicates the need to reduce plastic pollution of the ocean. In support it says for instance: “Studies have also shown that thousands of pieces of microplastic are even consumed by humans through seafood and table salt every year.”
Many organizations are involved in the initiative. Waste2Wear, Chinese and Dutch universities, the Dutch Consulate in Shanghai, Chinese NGOs and a number of companies. They have jointly set themselves the goal to tackle the problem of the plastic soup through an innovative concept.
Waste2Wear may seem to be a sympathetic idea, but making textiles from plastic waste is not a solution. The website does not mention that those “thousands of pieces or microplastic” are to a large extent released byplastic clothing. When synthetic textiles are machine washed and dried, an average of 9 million microfibers are released in each 5 kilograms wash, according to a study that appeared last year.
Plastic Soup Foundation’s Managing Director Maria Westerbos: “We welcome the fact that attention is asked for the plastic soup, but the of Waste2Wear initiative is not a solution. The real solution lies in cutting back the use of plastic as a raw material. “
Our suspicion has been confirmed; the deposit on plastic bottles introduced on 1st July this year has indeed had immediate results. The proportion of bottles in the litter found has decreased by 37%!
A different understanding of the extended producer responsibility is needed if the amount of plastic waste is to be reduced.
On 18th of September 2021, it’s World Cleanup Day once again. All information about the kick-off in Amsterdam and the event can be found here.
World Cleanup Day 2021: Plastic Soup Foundations celebrates all those heroes who clean up litter day after day.
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