{"id":67683,"date":"2025-12-05T18:00:00","date_gmt":"2025-12-05T17:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/international\/?post_type=p4_action&p=67683"},"modified":"2026-04-08T10:49:22","modified_gmt":"2026-04-08T08:49:22","slug":"learn-about-plastic-pollution","status":"publish","type":"p4_action","link":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/international\/campaigns\/learn-about-plastic-pollution\/","title":{"rendered":"Learn About Plastic Pollution"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n
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Learn About Plastic Pollution<\/h1>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Plastic has found its way to the depths of our oceans, to remote forest paths, to the ice of the Arctic, and onto the island beaches where turtles nest.<\/p>\n<\/div>

\"Plastic<\/figure><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

The Impact On Our Ecosystems<\/h2>\n\n

Plastic is polluting every corner of the planet. It has found its way to the depths of our oceans, to remote forest paths, to the ice of the Arctic, and onto the island beaches where turtles nest.

We don\u2019t know exactly how long oil-based plastic will take to degrade (or even if it ever will), but we do know that once it\u2019s in our soil, rivers, and oceans, it is impossible to clean up.

The plastic we see washing up on shores and floating on the water\u2019s surface is only the tip of the trashberg. Over two-thirds of the plastic in our oceans ends up on the sea floor, creating an ever-growing wasteland beneath the waves. To make matters worse, bottles, bags, and other plastic junk gradually break into smaller and smaller pieces known as microplastics, which further damage ecosystems even as they\u2019re invisible to the naked eye.<\/p>\n\n

Plastic waste is an equally big problem away from the high seas, filling up landfill sites, clogging rivers, and generating pollution through open burning or incineration. Some plastics also contain and leach out hazardous chemicals, posing further risks to wildlife and people.<\/p>\n

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The Recycling Myth<\/h2>\n\n

Globally, only 9% of plastic gets recycled. Even in developed countries, the recycling rate for plastics collected by households is often far less than 50%, with very little of that converted back into packaging. Most “recycled” packaging waste is downcycled into lower value or unrecyclable products, meaning that the process is only delaying the plastic\u2019s inevitable journey to the landfill.<\/p>\n\n

Bad packaging design, a lack of infrastructure, and the absence of a means to track plastic waste all limit the effectiveness of recycling, and ensure that most plastic packaging will continue to become waste for the foreseeable future.<\/p>\n\n

In the meantime, the companies that produce fast-moving consumer goods (FMCGs) are opening up new markets in the Global South, pushing more products packaged in single-use and single-portion plastics.<\/p>\n

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