Rapid increase in Asian bottles in the South Atlantic Ocean indicates major debris inputs from ships
- Journal:
- Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
- Published:
- DOI:
- 10.1073/pnas.1909816116
- Affiliations:
- 5
- Authors:
- 4
Research Highlight
Rubbish news from a remote island
© Hannele Lahti/Getty
Rubbish washing up on an uninhabited island in the Atlantic is mainly plastic bottles dumped at sea by cargo ships from Asia.
Many remote islands receive a constant stream of debris, delivered by ocean currents, that includes increasing amounts of plastic waste generally assumed to come from distant shores.
A team that included researchers from the University of Cape Town surveyed the mountains of litter on Inaccessible Island in the South Atlantic Ocean in the 1980s and again in 2009 and 2018, noting the country of origin for thousands of items. Their analysis revealed that the main source of waste has shifted from South America to Asia — by 2018, three quarters of all plastic bottles that washed up were made in Asia (mainly China).
The recent manufacturing dates on many bottles suggest they did not drift from the mainland, and were most likely dumped from Asian cargo ships.
References
- PNAS 116, 20892–20897 (2019). doi: 10.1073/pnas.1909816116