Join The Big Plastic Count
We’re all doing our bit to recycle, but plastic waste is still everywhere. Something doesn’t add up.
Greenpeace and Everyday Plastic have joined forces to encourage as many people as possible to collect their plastic waste for one week, 16th to 22nd May. They're going to use the data to help push the government, brands and supermarkets to take bold action to tackle the plastic crisis.
The inspiration for The Big Plastic Count is a unique personal experiment carried out by Everyday Plastic founder Daniel Webb. Daniel decided to count and categorise all his plastic waste for 12 months and photograph it for a billboard. He was shocked to discover his hoard of plastic waste totalled 4,490 individual pieces of plastic. Daniel said:
“Having counted my plastic waste for an entire year, I know exactly how powerful this investigation can be in helping to understand the true extent of the plastic problem. The Big Plastic Count is a simple yet impactful way to discover your household plastic footprint, whilst contributing vital evidence to push the government for long overdue change.”
Collect your plastic packaging during the week and add your results to the campaign website. Once the data from individual households has been collected, the national data on different types of plastic will be used to calculate how much would be collected for recycling, what’s likely to happen to it then, and what that means for our plastic footprint.
We can’t solve the plastic problem without big changes that only the government can make. Producers need to be forced to switch to reusable packaging. This campaign aims to reduce single-use plastic by 50% by 2025 (by switching to reusable packaging that meets everyone’s needs), ban dumping our waste in other countries, and implement a Deposit Return scheme.