Environmentalists, governments, businesses and individuals attending the Volvo Ocean Race Hong Kong Ocean Summit were urged to come together and find ways to ban single-use plastics to halt their impact on the health of the planet’s oceans and ultimately human wellbeing.

The plea came from Anders Jacobson a Bluewater top executive who pointed out that the planet’s reliance on plastic has left a legacy of polluted beaches, overflowing landfills and micro-plastic particles that have entered the water ecosystem and the marine and human food chains.

Recycling no longer the answer

Jacobson said the threat posed by environmental ocean pollution could no longer be resolved by mere recycling. Instead, he said, with Hongkongers alone dumping 5.2 billion plastic bottles every day according to Green Earth, the single-use plastics issue demands a complete rethink when it comes to production and use.

“With less than ten percent of the 480 billion plastic drinking water bottles produced yearly being recycled, it is surely time we rid ourselves and the planet of these unsustainable materials, that have already led to micro particles ending up in our tap water,” said Anders.

Partnering for change

Late last year, Bluewater committed to building a planet-wide movement that will harness human ingenuity to help bring cleaner, healthier water to everyone and create plastic-free oceans.

The company has launched a strategic push to fast-track wider public access to clean drinking water and disrupt the global beverage’s industry reliance on single-use plastic bottles.

This game changing step is emphasised by Bluewater’s announcement this week that it was joining forces with South Africa’s I-Drop Water, a for-profit social impact company that designs, builds and installs drinking water purification and dispensing machines in general grocery stores.

“We have the ingenuity, we have the solutions, all we need is the commitment of mindful businesses, caring public citizens and concerned lawmakers who want to leave a strong legacy for future generations. Let’s do it together, let’s make the change towards a world free of single-use plastics,” Jacobson concluded.