A Plastic Ocean

“The animals of the world deserve blue ocean. Not this.” - Doug Allen

Before 'A Plastic Ocean' went into production, filmmaker Craig Leeson set out to make a documentary about the largest animal on planet earth, the Blue Whale along with it’s smaller relative, the Pygmy Blue Whale. With a specialist team on board, his crew chased this immense sea creature day in, day out trying to keep up with their unpredictable journeys through the Indian Ocean by using specialist technology to hear their deep, vast calls through a field of high-pitched dolphin song.

After two weeks, the team including underwater cameraman, Doug Allen, managed to capture what they say was the first underwater shot of a juvenile pygmy whale. It was mind-blowing.

But sitting above these incredible shots of one of nature’s most mysterious, peaceful and majestic creatures, was an “emulsified mess of oil and bits” according to Doug, who despite what he had just filmed said, "that was one of the most unpleasant dives i’ve ever done." This was to become a documentary of a very different nature- Craig and the team instead set out on a four year project to discover the true scale of the toxic waste that coats the ocean and our land. Sadly as they discover, the situation is so widespread, so engrained in our seas that it is described in the film as "insidious". We imagine waste in the sea to be floating bottles and rope, but so much of the pollution is made up from tiny micro-plastics, which are broken down from the larger items, releasing toxic chemicals in the process.

There are so many challenging scenes throughout this documentary that are really difficult to watch, but if these stories aren't told we have no idea what impact we are having, and without knowing, we can't care. Scenes include instances of seabirds and whales who have died prematurely, and whose stomachs have been opened after death for investigation. The level of plastic that had totally stuffed and stretched their stomachs to the brim in each case was disgusting- if the toxicity from the plastic chemicals hasn't managed to poison the animals to death, it was the huge pieces of plastic that had blocked their digestive systems and stopped them being able to eat, resulting in starvation. One chick was found with 276 pieces of plastic in it's stomach- that's the equivalent to us having 12 pizzas worth of plastic in ours. Imagine that pain. As the team point out in the film, whales feed by opening their mouths and just sucking up whatever is in their path. This is because when they evolved, there was nothing toxic to swallow. We also see turtles mistake plastic bags for jellyfish and chemicals from tiny broken down plastic particles called micro plastics, making their way into the blood streams of the fish that humans eat. Later in the film we learn that in the Western Mediterranean, there is a 1 to 2 ratio of plastic to plankton.

When it comes to a solution, there are some really hopeful projects, particularly Boyan Slat's 'The Ocean Clean Up' (see our earlier post on this) whose ambition is to clear up the Great Pacific Rubbish Vortex, a sort of 'plastic soup' in the ocean that we talk about in our other article. If this project could be replicated across the world we could, in theory eventually rid the ocean of the plastic that's already in it. But as hard as the team are working that can't happen today, and it's efforts will be wasted if we carry on adding more.

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The main messages at the end of the production are to reuse and recycle, which by now we all know (although many that can still don't bother- if this is you, PLEASE do it). The other clear message is to simply refuse single use plastic, encouraging us that the consumer has the power. (To clarify, single use plastic is the type that cannot be recycled, usually thinner and foil-like, for example the stuff that covers packs of biscuits, that vegetables are wrapped in etc) Craig suggests that we take one use plastics off the products we buy and leave them at the shop to send a clear message to the suppliers. But I wonder how many of us would realistically have the courage to do so? I'm still left wondering how we really change the way our food and fashion industries run, on a mass scale. It seems to me that bans on all throwaway plastic need to be introduced across the world, and it's a shame that as we currently stand this doesn't happen purely on the basis of environmental consciousness. "We've treated the ocean as a pace to throw things, dispose of things that we do not want close to where we live" - Dr. Sylvia Earle

(Picture: A Plastic Ocean)

'A Plastic Ocean', along with a report by The Ocean Conservancy also shows us that around 60% of the plastic in our oceans actually comes from just 6 countries- China, Philippines, Vietnam, Indonesia and Thailand. Why is this? Because although their industries and economy are rapidly developing, a proper infrastructure for waste is much slower to catch up. (Read the full report here: https://oceanconservancy.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/full-report-stemming-the.pdf) While Scandinavia for example are so efficient with their recycling, that they actually have to import it to keep their recycling plants going (http://ind.pn/2hmAI08), "less than half" of the rubbish is properly collected in those Asian countries. This is much easier for countries such as Norway and Sweden, because they are developed countries, so we need to help those who are still developing to solve this issue. It's important to note that plastic can be, and is an amazing thing that we've developed as humans- it makes so much sense and can actually be very efficient in lots of circumstances, but NOT when it's throw-away. Plastic lives a life-time, so if we are using it, we need to make use of it for that long too. 'A Plastic Ocean' does touch on some solutions, however we'd love to see a second film, focusing on what we can do next to build a sustainable future where plastic only improves the lives of people and the environment, rather than having a negative effect.

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You can watch "A Plastic Ocean" on Netflix now, or you can rent it from Vimeo here: https://vimeo.com/ondemand/aplasticocean