{"id":12536,"date":"2020-11-04T07:45:08","date_gmt":"2020-11-04T07:45:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/africa\/?p=12536"},"modified":"2021-12-01T12:41:37","modified_gmt":"2021-12-01T12:41:37","slug":"nurdle-hurdle-the-department-of-environment-needs-to-take-bold-action-and-ban-single-use-plastic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/africa\/en\/press\/12536\/nurdle-hurdle-the-department-of-environment-needs-to-take-bold-action-and-ban-single-use-plastic\/","title":{"rendered":"Nurdle Hurdle: The Department of Environment Needs to Take Bold Action and Ban Single-Use Plastic"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Reactive<\/h2>\n\n

Johannesburg, 03 November 2020 \u2014 Responding to reports<\/a> that plastic nurdles are washing up in the Southern Cape and on Cape Town beaches, Greenpeace Africa Plastic Campaign Lead Angelo Louw has said: <\/p>\n\n

\u201cThe fact that we have seen so many of these nurdle spills destroy our coastlines over the past few years should make it clear to the South African government that we need to ramp up our efforts as a country to eradicate single-use plastics, like many other African countries already have. <\/p>\n\n

\u201cIn 2017, over 40 tonnes of plastic nurdles were scattered across KwaZulu Natal and took close to three months of clean up efforts to curb the damage that had resulted from a container ship spill.<\/p>\n\n

\u201cNurdles are a huge threat to marine life as they can be mistaken for food leading to blocked digestive systems and ultimately death of these animals. This latest environmental catastrophe in Southern Cape and Cape Town will not only impact the quality of life for its marine and wildlife, but also the citizens. The Department of Environment, Forestry and Fisheries can no longer dance around the issue, a ban on single-use plastic is crucial in improving the quality of lives of ordinary South Africans.\u201d<\/p>\n\n

In September, Greenpeace Africa and 4,000 South Africans submitted individual submissions to the Department\u2019s call of comment on new plastic bag regulations. They called for a complete ban on single-use plastic bags, as enforced in Kenya and Rwanda where the environment has substantially improved since plastic bags were outlawed.  <\/p>\n\n

ENDS<\/p>\n\n

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FIGHT FOR A PLASTIC-FREE FUTURE <\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n

Contact details<\/h2>\n\n

Chris Vlavianos, Greenpeace Africa Communications Officer, 079837036, cvlavian@greenpeace.org<\/a><\/p>\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t<\/a>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\n \t\t\t

\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\tPlastic Free Future\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/a>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t \n Get Involved\n <\/a>\n \t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/section>\n\t","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Responding to reports that plastic nurdles are washing up in the Southern Cape and on Cape Town beaches, Greenpeace Africa Plastic Campaign Lead Angelo Louw has said<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":28,"featured_media":12537,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"ep_exclude_from_search":false,"p4_og_title":"","p4_og_description":"","p4_og_image":"","p4_og_image_id":"","p4_seo_canonical_url":"","p4_campaign_name":"not set","p4_local_project":"not set","p4_basket_name":"not set","p4_department":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[30,65],"p4-page-type":[14],"class_list":["post-12536","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-protecttheenvironment","tag-plastics","tag-southafrica","p4-page-type-press"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/africa\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12536","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/africa\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/africa\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/africa\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/28"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/africa\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12536"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/africa\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12536\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":49935,"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/africa\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12536\/revisions\/49935"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/africa\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12537"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/africa\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12536"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/africa\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12536"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/africa\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12536"},{"taxonomy":"p4-page-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/africa\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/p4-page-type?post=12536"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}