PUBLISHED May 26th, 2021 05:32 pm | UPDATED July 25th, 2024 02:31 pm
Plastic pollution is one of the most pressing problems of today. Plastic waste has flooded our land, our waterways, and the air around us, leading to dire effects for our planet’s ecosystem. Every year, about 8 million tonnes of plastic ends up in our ocean, travelling around the world.
The UK is the second largest producer of plastic waste, behind the US. And although its government has declared to reduce plastic pollution, a recent study conducted by Greenpeace UK uncovers another problem. The UK’s plastic waste is being dumped and burned in other countries like Turkey and Malaysia. Greenpeace’s new short film, Wasteminster: A Downing Street Disaster, calls out the UK’s leaders in a short, but effective way.
Greenpeace and Park Village Studios’ two minute film sees an animated Boris Johnson (voiced by Matt Forde and Jon Culshaw) declaring their efforts to reduce plastic pollution – using real quotes from both Boris Johnson and Michael Gove. Although not entirely baseless, it’s evident that many of these declarations of change are filled with empty promises. Until massive amounts of plastic waste begin to rain down around him, which is supposedly the amount of plastic that the UK has dumped on Turkey (it’s been a favourite destination for UK waste exports after the 2017 China ban).
Wasteminster presents the physical problem astutely, but it’s important to remember the unseen effects of plastic pollution as well. As first-world countries off-load their plastic waste to developing countries, the plastic is incinerated rather than recycled. Toxic fumes are released into the air, which causes health issues like breathing problems, nosebleeds and headaches for nearby communities. Communities that were not the source of the problem, yet suffer the most.
Above all, Greenpeace’s short film serves to highlight the horrors of plastic pollution by presenting it in front of the government’s doorstep. And their use of political satire only helps to appeal to the masses – a good thing too, as Wasteminster ends with a call to action, a petition to the government to take responsibility for the plastic pollution problem. What does this supposed action look like? This is one question that Wasteminster doesn’t answer.
Leaders of the UK might be the starting point of tackling such a crisis, though it can only do so much with so little direction. The old mantra of reduce, reuse, and recycle, doesn’t quite cut it anymore. Greenpeace’s short film is a start, though it doesn’t offer any solutions.
Wasteminster is much less short and sweet than it is direct and powerful. Watching this short film will open your eyes to a pertinent problem with lasting consequences on our environment. It might only last two minutes, but its message is something that extends beyond our own contexts.
Watch Wasteminster: A Downing Street Disaster here.
Top image: Wasteminster