Communities Hold the Key to Tackling Plastic Pollution

In May 2025, a groundbreaking scientific paper  on the global challenge of plastic pollution was published in “Microplastics and Nanoplastics,” called “Towards a ‘theory of change’ for ocean plastics: a socio-oceanography approach to the global challenge of plastic pollution.”

Surprisingly, the press coverage was scarce – inversely proportional to the relevance, clarity, and urgency of this message. For a change, the solution mentioned was relatable, accessible, and applicable to many of us. Furthermore, it wasn’t outside our reach – no PhD in chemistry required to understand it!

In this study, a multi-disciplinary, UK-led, team of scientists, took readers across the globe, with the question: “What role do communities have in socio-oceanography?”. For those who don’t know, socio-oceanography is an emerging field analyzing the interactions between humans and the oceans. It combines both ocean and social sciences, trying to understand how human activities and oceanic health are connected. 

Since the trash in the oceans starts on our streets, ocean-litter should concern everyone, even those living far from a body of water. Mismanaged waste first invades rivers, later ending up in seas and oceans, adding to the pre-existing beach litter. Next, microplastics from trash travel into the rain water, seep into the soil, and eventually, through the meat we consume, the seafood, and the vegetables, they make it to the dinner table, and then into our bloodstream…

Though this pollution is concerning, the scientists point to a solution which is encouraging, giving us real hope for improvement. However, only when we align our hopes with simple actions, will we truly begin to clean up the planet.

This solution? Communities are powerful forces capable of tidying up the Earth. Of course, this is a generational process extending beyond our lifetimes; we are doing this for our children and grandchildren! Yes, corporations play a major role; they must reduce plastic production to make a difference. But our actions can also be impactful, and that is just what this study proves. We’re so key that we can’t even spell ‘socio-oceanography’ without including people!

The study discusses four community types related to socio-oceanography: virtual (such as readers stimulated by this article), geographical (think ‘neighbors’), practice-based (job-specific groups), and circumstantial (persons connected by a common problem, online or offline).

Communities can overlap, and when it comes to healing Earth, less is not more! In fact, we want them to collide and blend, supporting and inspiring one another!

The Trash-Pickup World Cup

Not many know that Japan organized the Trash-Pickup World Cup in 2023, but the British certainly do. Out of twenty-one teams, the UK earned first prize! In an age where large sporting events are significant trash generators, this competition clearly stands out. However, while it serves a great purpose, its audience is niche when compared to the fast-growing problem.

In other words, humanity and the planet won’t fully benefit from this healthy concept unless it goes global, becoming… an Olympic Game. This is a one of a kind game, since all participating nations win in the end, even if they all don’t get a medal. It will make an impact not once every four years, but daily, in our communities, via improved human and environmental health. Even out of the stadium, everyone can be a trash-athlete! Here’s how the Trash-Pickup Olympic Sport can work as an engaging concept, even before it becomes an official presence at the Olympics.

The Trash Olympics – When Urgency Meets Popularity  

If you’re reading this, and agree that picking up trash should reach Olympic-level fame, but for some reason you can’t show support by doing a cleanup, no problem! Not everyone is able or available to do that, and some parts of the world are litter-free. However, including the topic in conversations is a valid form of promoting a well-deserved spike in popularity for cleanups. One fast, easy way to do that is through sharing this article with your networks. That’s when you and your acquaintances will become part of the virtual community mentioned in the study! 

In case you do a cleanup – whether alone or with others, planned or spontaneous – you’ll enter your geographical community. Don’t forget to register each cleanup on the Great Global Cleanup Map, which is a great tool helping you to keep track of your ‘Olympic cleanup sessions.’ Even more so, once you use the map, you might be pleasantly surprised when other locals shall join you! And if they keep showing up, and some decide to create a cleanup group, that will count as a practice-based community, too! 

All these are also communities of circumstance, because everyone is taking a stand against litter. The above illustrate how one person could activate organically up to all four community types highlighted in the paper. Since the primary focus of the study was on behavioral shifts (such as littering less, picking up litter, increasing community awareness, motivation, education, and involvement in decision-making), the authors registered the quality of the responses – not the quantity – to measure community engagement. Meaning that one or a few individuals who have initiative, can be as valuable qualitatively as a larger group, in the long run. So, if you feel like doing a cleanup, but you are alone, don’t shy away.

One of the few statistics in the study estimates that 29 Million Tons of plastic will enter oceans annually by 2040; this is more than twice as much as in 2010. And it echoes another grim forecast, that by 2050 oceans may contain more plastic than fish, by weight. 

However, the study indicates that eco-progress is possible and contagious, since one’s actions can inspire others, triggering change through a ripple effect of awareness. This positive outcome was noticed in the second case-study from the paper. When a group of Indian fishermen broke the cycle of eco-inaction, picking up litter from a long-neglected lake – the unexpected happened! Others followed suit, snapping out of idleness!

On the same positive note, next comes an example not affiliated with the paper, but which goes very well with the theme, since it shows how drastically the situation has improved in just two years once community members stepped in. After the July 4th festivities at Lake Tahoe in 2023, party goers left behind 8,500 pounds of ‘celebratory litter,’ picked up the next morning by a few hundred volunteers. Fast-forward to July 5^th 2025, only 1,375 pounds were collected, which is an 84 percent littering reduction since 2023, and 26 percent less compared to 2024! There are more factors involved, but one take-home message is that societal eco-progress is achievable. And since the 2023 incident made headlines globally, another message is that public attention stimulates accountability.

Meanwhile, world officials just left the fifth session of the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee in Geneva without settling on binding rules to limit global plastic production. What action will you take?  Given that both Climate Week and World Cleanup Day are right around the corner, you can plan to mark these days with a cleanup which you can find at our Great Global Cleanup map. You can also sign the Global Plastic Treaty, telling your countries’ representatives that we want to get plastic pollution out of our environment. 

Additionally, in the U.S., the EPA is seeking to eliminate the Endangerment Finding. Sign this letter to tell Lee Zeldin to protect our health and our environment. This will affect us all, as we all breathe the same air. 

Of course, healing Earth is a generational process. We can’t expect anything different when the lifetime of a plastic bag is up to 1000 years – and ours is under 100. But hopefully cleanups will become our global Earth-love-language at the Olympics. Until then, brainstorming rules or picking up trash, keep the concept alive.  

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