*Although I do not advocate that clean-ups be the solution for plastic pollution, I do think they are a valuable tool to understand waste trajectories when waste categorization and brand audits are included. Clean-ups that immediately take and dispose of the material are, in effect, ‘destroying the evidence.’ Waste audits allow students, concerned community members, activists etc. to piece together a fuller picture of what is actually happening with waste. Is it coming from the sea and other countries? Is it coming from the local municipality? Are foreign multinational brands mostly responsible for the packaging or is it local companies? When you start to ask these sorts of questions, it is a platform for putting together a presentation or policy brief to local politicians to help to drive the change you want to see around how materials are packaged and disposed of.
