The Challenge

the challenge - plastic pollution

Our oceans are drowning in plastic!

150 million tons of plastic is drifting in the ocean today.
Almost eight million tons of plastic leaks into the ocean each year, and China and Indonesia are the highest contributors in the world.
Imagine one Asian elephant weighing on average three tons. Now turn that into plastic and visualise 1,221 Asian elephants walking into the ocean every day – this is how much plastic Indonesia leaks into the ocean. Every day!
If we don’t change our behaviour, it is expected that there will be more plastic than fish (by weight) in our oceans by 2050.

Ocean plastic is killing our wildlife and making us sick

Seabirds, whales, sea turtles and other marine life eat marine plastic and die from choking, intestinal blockage and starvation. Around one-third of marine turtles have likely eaten marine debris.
Wildlife get tangled in plastic and can drown, suffocate, strangulate or be badly injured.
Plastic acts like a sponge, absorbing pollutants and toxins, harming marine wildlife and those who eat it – including us.

Plastic never goes away: it slowly breaks down to “microplastic”, measuring between one and five millimetres, and can exist in recognisable forms for hundreds of years.

In 2018 a dead sperm whale washed ashore in East Indonesia with 5.9kg of plastic in its stomach, including 115 single-use plastic cups.

The BfB program greatly affects my daily life. I don't use single-use plastic anymore because plastic waste causes death for sea animals ..."

- Jesika, Student at SDN 5 Tonja