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Plastics Treaty Negotiations in Ottawa

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 Plastics Treaty Negotiations in Ottawa  Oil friendly nations and corporations, including the United States, are lobbying hard for voluntary reductions in plastic production, distribution and waste. At the same time, environmentalists and others who care deeply about human and environmental health are lobbying for stricter legislation and policies that face down the growing threat of doubling or tripling of plastic production in the next decades. Voluntary actions will no longer cut it. This is a ruse by corporations to continue their endless exploitation of fossil fuels for financial gain. We desperately need legislation that limits production and distribution of single use plastics with clear and accountable targets and goals Already the nation is dumping the equivalent of 2,000 trash trucks worth of plastic waste into our oceans and water ways. This in addition to the millions of tons of plastic waste already clogging our waters, fields, and even our bodies.  However, major oil and
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Corporations are to Blame for Plastics Crisis

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 Corporations have tried to blame consumers....it's really them! In a recent article in Grist Magazine , we learn again that it's not individuals who are to blame for the plastics crisis. It is the corporations that knowingly continue to produce plastic and pass the debt on to consumer and municipalities.  Corporations know that plastic recycling is a non-starter, yet they still try to make us believe that plastics are and always have been recycled into useful new items. In fact, less than 8% of plastics nationally are recycled meaning that more than 90% of plastic is just waste that never breaks down. Most plastics are too complicated in their configuration to be recycled in the first place.    Our municipalities then bear the brunt of collecting, sorting, and hauling the plastic waste. Our environment bears the brunt of plastic waste literally everywhere. And we humans bear the health consequences by ingesting plastic into our system every day. We know that plastic is in our
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International Plastics Treaty

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April 18, 2024 International Delegates Meet in Ottawa to Advance Global Plastics Treaty Ottawa will be the site of Round 4 of  international negotiations facilitated by the United Nations Environmental Programme. Participants in the treaty negotiations are aiming for the end of the year to have a legally-binding agreement in place that would addressing the growing problem of plastics.  All stages of plastic are harmful to humans and the environment from 1) extraction of fossil fuels, 2) production of plastics, 3) distribution and use of plastics, 4) disposal of plastics, and 5) long-term disintegration of plastics.  Plastics have been sold to us as a modern convenience. Indeed they are. But the human and environmental costs to us are enormous. We are gaining more and more information about the immensity of the problem and its impacts on the environment and human health every day. An international treaty along with strong national legislation that begins to restrict plastic production,
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Plastic Waste in the Great Lakes

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 Vast Matjority of Waste in the Great Lakes is Plastic - Millions of Pounds Every Year A new report presents troubling findings: 85% of the waste in our Great Lakes (tens of millions of pounds every single year) is plastic: https://twitter.com/A4GL/status/1778414722162806795/photo/1 . Confirmation of this reality is yet another indication that plastic, particularly single use plastics, is an enormous problem where the United States is responsible for 45% of worldwide production, distribution, and use of plastics even though Americans constitute only 4% of the world's population.  Plastics have huge human health and environmental implications that disproportionately impact environmental justice communities. But all of the plastic waste impacts every single corner of the globe. We are all impacted.  This blog explores the problem of single use plastics and equips you with information, tools, and resources to understand and act on this problem.  This blog is brought to you by Organizi
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