Waste survey exposes extent of plastic pollution in Manila Bay

“Manila Bay has become a huge floating dump for the whole of
Metro Manila and the other coastal provinces from the Bataan
peninsula down to Cavite,” said Greenpeace Southeast Asia
campaigner Beau Baconguis. “The immense volume of assorted plastic
garbage littering its coasts and floating in its currents is
symbolic of the trashing of Manila Bay, and serves as a visual
reminder of the pollution that is slowly killing the seas,” she
added.

Declared a pollution hotspot in 1999 by the Partnerships in
Environmental Management for the Seas in East Asia (PEMSEA), Manila
bay suffers from pollution from industries which dump their
effluents (often toxic) in the bay or in its estuaries, as well as
from commercial activities and domestic sewage. Degradation of the
bay has long before reached alarming levels, directly affecting the
health and livelihoods of around 10 million people living in the
vicinity(1).

The huge volume of plastic trash which regularly finds its way
to this important body of water impacts greatly on the
sea-suffocating vital marine ecosystems and the plant, animal, and
human lives that these support. Along with less visible but equally
harmful pollutants, plastics have smothered the bay’s mangrove, sea
grass, and coral ecosystems, and as in other coastal areas where
plastic trash predominates, have led to the death of birds and
marine animals via ingestion or entanglement.

The plastic waste survey and documentation undertaken today by
Greenpeace and Eco-Waste Coalition highlights the urgency of
implementing waste management laws on land, particularly those
concerning plastics such as disposable (single-use) packaging which
is expected to be the main plastic culprit in Manila Bay.

Eco-Waste coalition plans to donate the recyclables which will
be collected from the activity to Smokey Mountain communities. The
rest of the plastic trash will be incorporated in installation art
created by artist Ed Manalo. The sculptures will be donated to the
National Ecology Center. The M.Y. Esperanza also plans to tour a
sculpture for the rest of its expedition which includes the Trash
Vortex, an area in the North Pacific where plastic trash from all
over the world has converged in a great gyrating mass.

“Protecting our oceans from pollution means implementing
measures on land so that land-based pollution sources are
effectively controlled,” said Eco-Waste Coalition secretary Manny
Calonzo, “Toward this end, the government should mandate the
listing and prohibition of environmentally unacceptable products,
including those used for packaging. Corporations and retailers
should also phase out the manufacture and use of single-use plastic
products and packaging to enable consumers to veer away from such
disposable plastic products.”

The Greenpeace ship M.Y. Esperanza is visiting the Philippines
from August 15 to September 3, 2006 as part of her global journey
to expose the environmental threats to the world’s oceans and to
campaign for the establishment of marine reserves. The visit to the
Philippines will draw attention to the grave impacts of land based
pollution to the country’s fragile marine environment.

Greenpeace is an independent, campaigning organisation which
uses non-violent, creative confrontation to expose global
environmental problems, and to force solutions essential to a green
and peaceful future. Greenpeace is committed to defending the
health of the world’s oceans and the plants, animals, and people
who depend upon them.