The Mediterranean Sea: The Other Great Garbage Patch

by Marah Hardt, change.org, lJanuary 15, 2011

If you think the Great Pacific Garbage patch is bad (which it is, despite recent news reports), just imagine all that trash smooshed into a nearly land-locked sea surrounded by even higher human population densities.

Welcome to the modern Mediterranean—the historic heart of western civilization, now pumped full of all its crap.

Forget bronzed bods stretched along the Riviera or clear deep blue waters of Cousteau.  Preliminary surveys of the surface of the Mediterranean taken this summer reveal that the top several inches of the sea are swarming with plastic—more than 250 billion pieces across the entire Med. This equates to nearly 500 tons of garbage and presents an enormous threat to wildlife and challenge to the many fisheries and other industries that depend upon a healthy sea—and its famous beaches.

Most of the plastic particles found were "micro-debris" with weights of 1.8 milligrams or less.  These particles mix in with plankton and are then ingested by small fish which in turn are consumed by larger fish, which then wind up on our dinner plates.  Not only can the plastic particles physically harm wildlife, but as accumulators of toxins, they can also poison them—and us.

Recently, volunteers with the Mediterranean in Danger Expedition (MED) boarded a 17-meter yacht and collected water samples off the coast of France, northern Italy and Spain, and turned up the astounding figure that 90 percent contained this kind of "micro-debris." They consider this a preliminary assessment, and plan to conduct more sampling this summer off the coast off Gibraltar, Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Sardinia and southern Italy.

The fact that the Mediterranean is full of trash is not new news. Despite the Romans inventing some of the most advanced sanitation systems, the Mediterranean has been plagued by trash for year. A global survey of ocean trash by Greenpeace in 2007 found the Mediterranean to be the most polluted—with plastic containers and bags the biggest source of trash.  Unfortunately, work from this summer proves that there has been little to no progress made to clean up this mess.

With wildlife and big industries on the line, it's time for the EU to take strong action to reduce plastic input in their revered sea.  Help put the pressure on officials to create strong and effective plastic-reducing policies by signing this petition by Credo Action here and help keep the modern Mediterranean from becoming the "Meditrashean."

GOT A TIP FOR US? Is there a story or campaign in your area that we'd want to know about? E-mail us at environmenttips@change.org. Please also follow Change.org's Environment page on Facebook and Twitter.

Link?  http://environment.change.org/blog/view/the_mediterranean_sea_the_other_great_garbage_patch