Cleaning Oceans: A Major Problem to Address

By, Muhammad Abrar bin Zamri

A critical problem of plastic cleanup projects is their narrow geographic and operational scope, which is unable to match the scale of oceanic plastic pollution. These programs are concentrated in high-profile areas such as the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, while other regions with equally serious plastic waste do not receive much attention. This focus on visible accumulations of plastic neglects the vast areas of open ocean, coastal waters, and deep sea to which plastic has been brought. This includes the unequal distribution of cleanup efforts, leaving many areas still polluted despite the effort being put forth.  

The narrow geographical scope of these projects lacks their long-run impact on the overall problem of marine pollution. While putting their efforts into certain places, these projects don’t consider the nature of people who can relocate plastic debris. This redistribution could result in the cleaning areas getting re-polluted, thus defeating the benefits of the cleanup effort. 

These efforts are countered by the processes whereby water flow can quickly re-pollute cleaned areas. Commonly, cleanup projects just focus on the removal of visible trash within certain portions of the ocean. What they fail to consider, however, is that marine currents constantly move plastic particles among other types of debris within seas. The dynamic nature of ocean currents demands an approach to plastic pollution, focusing on causes rather than symptoms. 

In addition, the investment of effort and resources in specific locations diverts attention and funds from other initiatives that would have higher impacts, such as global waste reduction and anti-littering laws. Such resources allocated to high-profile cleanup projects create a false sense of progress, as the root causes of plastic pollution remain unaddressed. Proper solutions require an integrated approach: prevent, educate, and change through policy. Cleaning high-profile areas risks missing broader and deeper systemic issues that feed the problem of plastic pollution. 

Moreover, evidence from cleanup efforts shows further that it does not make much of a difference. One of the biggest projects, the Ocean Cleanup Project, has taken tons of garbage out of the Pacific Ocean; but the total collection is only a few percentage points of the plastic that pollutes the oceans every year. Furthermore, regions like the Indian Ocean and the South Atlantic, which also suffer from high levels of pollution, are not addressed due to the project’s limited geographic scope. This gap highlights the failure of cleanup projects to scale appropriately to the global nature of plastic pollution mentioned Ryan et al., in 2020. 

Plastic clean-up projects can never solve the essential problem of oceanic pollution due to the narrow geographic and operative scope. Indeed, to successfully address marine plastic pollution, global efforts at prevention, waste management reform, and international cooperation must be advanced. Identifying and implementing the solutions for sources of plastic pollution demands systemic change to make a difference over time.***