1907: Plastic was invented
1933: Polyethylene was created (shopping bags, food packaging, bottles)
1970: Annual plastic production is 35m tonnes
2013: 215k tonnes of plastic is floating in the ocean (excludes plastics at depth). One third of this has accumulated to form ‘The Great Pacific Garbage Patch’ – 3x the area of Spain
2015: Annual plastic production is 381m tonnes (7bn cumulatively, 1 tonne per human)
2016: 344 species found to be affected by plastic entanglement, 233 species for ingestion
2050: 6m pieces of plastic estimated to be floating in the ocean
Plastics helped humanity flourish (food preservation, safety equipment, computers, construction) but we’ve not been accountable for the negative externalities it presented. It’s a waste management problem. For this particular problem, effective government regulation is better than leaving it to the free market.
Source: Our World in Data