Born and educated in Spain, Manuel Maqueda has sailed around the Americas for nine months on four-masted, top-sail schooner Juan Sebastián de Elcano, where he introduced recycling. He is the VP of Community and Strategy of BlooSee.com, a social atlas of the oceans, and a co-founder of the Plastic Pollution Coalition.
Q. You were one of the founders of Plastic Pollution Coalition; what are some of the most important things you think people should know about plastic etc.?
A. Plastic Pollution Coalition was created with the vision of a world free of plastic pollution and of the toxic impacts of plastic on humans, the environment, wildlife and marine life. We want to create a collaborative space for community, synergy, strategy and support for all the individuals and organizations interested in the study and remediation of this problem.
Plastic pollution is a new environmental challenge that is now starting to emerge into our consciousness, sort of like global warming 25 years ago. Nowadays, Internet and new media provide fantastic tools for collaboration and citizen activism. In the spirit of this new era, Plastic Pollution Coalition does not seek to replace the actions of any particular organization, but to help the entire movement grow, spread virally and incubate new ideas and solutions.
Plastics in the ocean are just the tip of a very complex and serious problem, and there is a great need for urgent action. In the marine environment, plastic breaks down into smaller and smaller particles that become powerful chemical attractors for really nasty pollutants such as PCBs and DDEs that are present in our ocean water. Almost all species of sea life are ingesting these toxic bits of plastic, either directly or indirectly, starting with plankton and filtering invertebrates which are eating tiny microplastics, and culminating with sea birds, whales and sea turtles.
Not surprisingly, harmful chemicals leached by plastics are already present in the bloodstream and tissues of almost every human baby. In fact, I like to say that the real garbage patch is not in the Pacific, but here on land: in our stores, homes, and refrigerators . . . and increasingly inside of our own bodies.
Plastic pollution is the result of a problem of design, not merely improper disposal, or lack of recycling. It is absolutely absurd and obscene to use a toxic material that takes 700 years to biodegrade to make objects that are designed to be thrown away after a few seconds, minutes, or days. That’s the root of the problem. Single use plastics, such as plastic bags, plastic bottles and plastic packaging, are so pervasive, and being produced and discarded at such a gigantic scale, that our planet is drowning in a waste that the earth cannot digest.
We will not solve this problem unless we pledge to change this throwaway mentality and shift away from these disposable habits. Businesses, not tax payers, should take responsibility for the end life of their products. When that happens, single use plastics and over packaging will stop spiraling out of control. We need to incorporate producer responsibility into our economies and demand transparency in the ways plastics are manufactured and disposed of. At the same time, we need to start holding businesses and governments accountable for the toxic effects of plastics on human health, and establish the precautionary principle as a general and compulsory principle of the law.
It is unbelievable that Bisphenol A and other toxic chemicals present in plastic are still legal, when scientific research has already established a risk to human health. The famous “three R’s” of Reduce, Reuse and Recycle, are not the only “R’s” we need. When I see a disposable object, such as a bag, or a bottle made out of a material that I know is so pervasive and toxic as plastic, the only R-word that comes to my mind is “Refuse!” That is the R that nobody is talking about, and I believe that it is the most important. Bring your own bag, carry your own bottle and reusable mugs, and refuse to participate in this disposable madness. Together we can effect huge change and become a part of the solution.
Q. Having been to Midway Island with Chris Jordan, what does Midway signify to you?
A. Midway is a tiny island, only two miles long, located right in the middle of the North Pacific Ocean. A speck in the map surrounded by thousands of miles of open ocean. For the Hawaiians, however, Midway is a place of ancient power and significance, a revered elder in a long dynasty of volcanic islands that once stretched from Kure Atoll to Kaua’i. Flowers of molten lava bloomed and decayed with the long seasons of geology, and left a marine landscape strewn with exquisite petals of azure.
In the Hawaiian tradition, the rosary of atolls that form the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands represents a long lineage of Kupuna, ancestors, who live a solitary life, in the heart of Papahanaumokuakea, the place where the union of Papa, the Mother Earth, and Wakea, the paternal sky, “give birth to islands in the vast expanses.” Midway is a sacred place, so sequestered and remote that Midway should be absolutely pristine. And yet the entire island is polluted with millions of disposable plastic objects such as cigarette lighters, toothbrushes, disposable razors and bottle caps. All this junk gets here inside of the bodies of the albatrosses that come to nest on Midway.
Albatrosses are large seabirds that forage all over the Central Pacific Ocean, can fly 300 miles a day, live to be 60 years old, and mate for life. Today, these majestic creatures find toxic junk of bright colors floating on the surface of the ocean, mistake it for food, and feed it lovingly to their nesting chicks. What a powerful metaphor. I went to Midway with four artists to witness and document this strange and profound phenomenon. However, there were many layers of depth to our endeavor. In a sense I saw Midway as a symbol of where we are as a culture. Our society has not yet figured out ways to deal with the planetary problems that we create. We are starting to realize that our present economic model, built around permanent growth, is not going to take us to a sustainable future. However, we don’t know yet what the new model is going to be, or how we will get there.
As for the albatross, to me it is a heroic messenger, an animal that is giving up its life to bring us a powerful message. A message that speaks of interconnection of all living systems, and also of our increasing disconnection with who we really are. Ultimately, plastic pollution originates inside of our hearts, and the prophecy of the albatross is that it shall return from where it came. Only then, maybe, the pain will make us leave this midway place and leap forward into the future.
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