World Wildlife Fund calling for change in how corporations use plastic

The World Wildlife Fund is calling on large corporations to handle their plastic differently.

“What we understand today is there is about a dump truck of plastic that is entering the ocean every minute,” said Erin Simon, director of sustainability at the World Wildlife Fund. “Eight million metric tons of plastic every year. That plastic’s not going anywhere. Even when it degrades, it’s just fragmenting and today, we know that over 800 species have come in contact with plastic.”

Data shows that as few as 100 companies have the potential to prevent roughly 10 million metric tons of the world’s plastic waste.

“Businesses must take a system-based approach to address their pollution footprint,” said Simon. “They need to do this by looking at plastic production and consumption and waste management and of course, recycling.”

For this reason, World Wildlife Fund has created the ReSource: Plastic activation hub.

“We know that the system is broken,” said Simon. “We know that it’s going to take everybody to solve for it. We know that businesses play a really unique and powerful role in it. The challenge is that today, they don’t have a clear roadmap for how to do that.”

For more information, go to worldwildlife.org/initiatives/plastics.

Image courtesy World Wildlife Fund