Plastic Impacts and Action
by Zuhura Ahmad
My name is Zuhura Ahmad, and I'm a young scientist teacher with a great passion for environmental conservation. People used to call me Mother of Environment. I know my story has just started, it is probably at its very early stage, but I love to work for a greener and cleaner environment because the environment is life and we all owe our life to the environment.
One of the important things I have learned from nature conservation is “even doing something small to nature can make a big difference”. Imagine a small seed that planted today can give tones of oxygen in the future. That's the mentality I apply to think about plastic pollution: one reused plastic of today can save more fish in the oceans.
Since I started to participate in a litter clean up, whether it was along the roadside on my daily walk or as an organised event to clean up a beach, one of the items I encounter most frequently is plastic bottles. Maybe you have had the same experience as me and perhaps you also ask yourself where did all plastic bottles come from? And how did they get there? It may surprise you to know that it all started from the ground.
Eventually, I was deeply touched by this and decided to do something about it. I began to volunteer in the Tanzania Youth Biodiversity Network as a chairperson and acted to spread information to my colleagues at Sokoine University of Agriculture on how to manage waste, particularly plastic waste. I developed a slogan which says “the way you manage waste at our campus tells us a lot about your off campus life." This was at least trying to remind students to free our campus from plastic pollution as plastics threaten our health, environment and our education.
The result was almost perfect as the colleagues seem to behave to stop throwing plastic bottles along the way and dump them into allocated bins where they can be taken by waste picker for recycling. Then after a year, I got to apply to volunteer in z non-profit organization (The Women on recycling foundation) where I seat as advocacy manager about the role of strengthening the waste management system, as well as skills development and knowledge sharing to enhance girls, women, and women with disabilities specifically, in local areas to establish recycling system in their place, promote waste management, reuse and recycling waste product and advocate for environmental and waste management policies and laws.
I can tell you with a heavy heart that despite the various efforts of the many African residents the situation of beating plastic has not improved. But stay with me here! I know it sounds bleak but if we are going to meaningfully change, we need to understand what is like now and not shy away from some hard truths about how it’s impacting us and our beautiful biosphere. Because once plastic enters the environment, it story continues like this one, common along the road and beaches regardless of how remote they are.
Plastic pollution knows no boundaries and brings serious impacts. Perhaps like me, you have seen a dead bird with plastics in its stomach, perhaps you have seen the image of the skeleton of albatross chicks whose bellies are stuffed with plastics, or you have read about a beached whale who had over 80kg of plastic particles in its stomach. Or seen animals like seals get caught up in plastic rope. This is how plastics pollution cause problems to our biodiversity.
Plastic pose threats to animals through entanglement, when they get bound up or stuck, through plastic ingestion, and when plastics blocks the pathway of an animal searching for food. Given this reality, I have an example that happened to me: in early 2019, a cow of mine died due to the ingestion of plastic bags. It hurt my feelings, and it was hard to face. But this gave me the courage also to continue to make some meaningful noise to beat plastic pollution. And it helps since in Tanzania we have burned plastic bags and brought a new economic cycle of paper and alternative bags. So as you can see, every action no matter how small it is has lasting consequences.
We also need to engage women in recycling since women are more innovative and inclusion of them will directly contribute to an improved outcome, such as eco bricks from plastic wastes that will help to tackle plastic pollution.
Lastly, let me leave you with this thought; change begins with one person and my story so far is a testament to that. And I firmly believe that every individual has a potential to be a change maker. After all we know that climate change is real, and it is expected that by 2050 there will be more plastics than fish in the oceans. So our action today will determine and shape our future. Therefore I believe when we try to change our outlook to stop viewing plastic waste as a challenge and view it as an opportunity, it will give us the drive and motivation we need to implement the change.
About
Young scientist and teacher passionate about environmental conservation and art , with relevant experience gained at environmental projects and through wide-ranging involvement with youth environmental organizations. Zuhura is a volunteer of Tanzania youth biodiversity network, an organization that is active on biodiversity and empower youth to lead the shift that will enable society to live harmoniously with nature. She is an Earth Day.Org Tanzania volunteer and ambassador of my future my voice at earthday.org. She won Earth day contest 2020 organized by Nipe fagio environmental organization based in Dar es salaam Tanzania. 1-time national winner of the African Youth Initiative on climate change. She currently is a women recycling foundation advocacy manager that builds capacity and empowers women through environmental recycling activities, creating thriving communities, in which all fully participate and develop freely waste society.