Help Save the World: No Pollution
This article was written by 4th grader Mustafa Hafeez as a part of Hanabi’s collaboration with the ES Newsletter Club in its first edition of The Elementary Voice.
No oceans, no humanity. The state of the world looks dire, so there are three things you need to know: the dangers of plastic, how it gets to the ocean, and what will happen if marine life goes extinct.
Dangers of plastics
Forty percent of plastic waste will end up in the oceans, killing countless animals. An animal will eat plastic or trash and die, and when that animal dies, it will kill the predator of that animal too because the predator won’t have any food. Another danger is that plastic will produce acids in the water until it dissolves. Think about the coffee your parents drank this morning; according to the World Wildlife Foundation of Australia, it will take 30 years for that cup to dissolve. And that toothbrush that you just threw out that will take 500 years to dissolve.
How does it get into the ocean?
Well, one way is through rain or wind which blows into rivers, and rivers lead to oceans. Another way is that boats usually throw their waste straight into the ocean, and, as you know, that kills animals.
Finally, sewers dump their waste straight into the ocean as well. This means that people should stop flushing plastic because the sewer just dumps all of the waste. Everything is thrown away.
What will happen if all marine life dies?
Families whose lives depend on catching fish will have to find new jobs or they will go bankrupt. Also, 50% of the earth’s oxygen is in the ocean, so people will have trouble breathing too. Plankton populations have decreased by 40% since 1950, and there is now commercial exploitation by Norwegian and Japanese fishing. Another issue is climate change; tsunamis and other natural disasters will also be consequences of marine life dying.
As you can see, without oceans, there is no humanity. This is an urgent issue, but now you know the three things you need to know to take action to save the world.