The recent trend of throw-away items and the way it affects the environment is an undeniable issue on many fronts for a variety of reasons. This issue started to gain momentum in the early pandemic; however, it is the cause of a bigger issue. The issue being the rising fossil fuel and one-use plastic industry.
The causes of this issue could be traced back to the industrial revolution and the era of automation. This era marked an important time in human history as humans started to produce more of everything; therefore, everyday items started to lose value in the minds of the people. As the people started to care less for their possessions, they started to buy for the simple purpose of buying with the help of automation. And the more people started to buy, the more they started to trash the environment. This topic is especially true for the plastics industry since plastics have such long times before nature starts consuming them back, compared to natural resources such as wood or glass, which don’t cause an issue when returning back to nature. This problem became a bigger deal with the pandemic as big companies started to sell from digital platforms, making the stuff people buy require even less effort and not leaving an afterthought on people’s minds. The throw-away issue and its plethora of effects can be seen by many people who work in biology and chemical engineering who know the ins and outs of the problem. So how can this issue be fixed? There can be many fixes to this issue; however, I personally want to highlight a few, these being the predatory marketing by the big companies, regulations of the plastic industry, and better education about recycling. As stated before, big companies specifically make buying easier and only contribute to this issue. There should be certain guidelines in which companies can advertise. Secondly, the plastic industry should not be allowed to make one-use plastic items which help worsen the issue on environmental effects humanity has on nature. Last but not least is the recycling lie; unlike what is told, only a small percentage of waste can be recycled, and even fewer of the plastic wastes. There should be government programs to educate people on what recycling is.
To sum up, the throw-away issue could be traced back to the industrial revolution and is the result of the automation that came with it. The issue only increased with the digital age and modern-day marketing. The solution for these issues are better education, regulations on the fossil fuel industry, and the banning of predatory marketing.