AN environmental crisis is unfolding along the north-western coast of Spain, where a billion plastic pellets, lost overboard from a containership, are washing ashore, reports Dublin's Irish Independent.
Green Member of the European Parliament Grace O'Sullivan visited the Galician coast over the weekend to meet with volunteers working to clean up the ongoing mess that arrives with each new tide.
The incident sparked a political dispute just weeks after the European Commission proposed stricter regulations on the transportation of plastic pellets.
However, industry lobbyists are pushing for a diluted version of the proposal, and its journey to becoming law is expected to be lengthy.
Even if implemented, the regulation won't address the fundamental issue of the increasing use of plastics, contributing to plastic pollution in our seas, soils, wildlife, and diets.
The incident originated on December 8 when the Liberian-flagged 8,600 TEU Toconao, chartered by shipping giant Maersk, lost six containers in the seas off Galicia.
One of these containers held 1,000 25kg sacks of new white plastic pellets intended for melting down and molding into water bottles and other food containers.
Measuring just two to three mm across, each pellet can easily be mistaken for a tiny pebble or a fragment of broken shell or fish cartilage, requiring volunteers to use tweezers to extract them.
"They have to be so careful," said Ms O'Sullivan.
"On one beach we met volunteers who were mainly shellfish collectors."
"They're predominantly women who go out and handpick the shellfish, which is a very sustainable way of collecting the shellfish, but tough on them physically," said Ms O'Sullivan.
"Unfortunately, as is so often the case when a workforce is predominately female, they are lowest in the pecking order in terms of wages, conditions, and pensions. And now they're dealing with this as well."
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