Pollution in the Water; Who is Making a Change?

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Dylan Lordi

In today’s society, we have islands of trash in the ocean. A leading cause of this trash is from people littering and not cleaning the beaches up after themselves. Animals in the ocean are suffering from the trash. Seals get caught in plastic rings and other dangerous plastics suffocate the animals. We hear people always say, “Clean up your trash” at a beach. But making sure this is followed out and then ensuring that your trash goes in the right bin leads to a better environment for us and others. However, the real question is what are we going to do in the long run? What is the next 30 year plan to keep up the tradition to keep our oceans clean?

A privately owned company named “4Ocean” is a profit owned company founded by two surfers that realized the problem while in the water surfing. 4Ocean started in 2017, forming small community groups that went to beaches for a day to clean up. Now, in 2019, 4Ocean has paid workers doing this for a living every day as a job. They hold events all around the country to shine more light on this growing problem. They hire people from all around the world to work in either Haiti, Bali or Florida. On their website they have a bracelet for sale completely made from recycled trash from the ocean. Even though this bracelet cost $20 USD, it removes an entire 1 pound of trash from our oceans. 

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So far, 4Ocean has removed just about 7 million pounds of trash from the ocean and counting. They have developed new technology such as barricades at river mouths which 4Ocean says is “a way to stop plastic from getting into rivers.” Not only that, they also recycle all trash they collect from their heavy duty trash bags and the barricades. Additionally, they have newly developed boats that pick up trash when driven over, which is a more efficient way of collecting. Even with the work 4Ocean is doing, we the people need to make a difference everyday even if it is just making sure you put your own trash in the garbage.