Tel Aviv coastline third most plastic-polluted in Med, report claims
World Wildlife Fund study says one kilometer stretch of coast in Israeli city accumulates 21kg of plastic waste per day, as organization urges countries to reduce plastic production, bolster recycling programs
The Israeli metropolis ranked behind the beaches of Turkey’s Cilicia region and those of Barcelona. The report sampled plastic waste from a select list of shorelines and did not examine all cities along the Mediterranean.
According to the report, a one-kilometer stretch of Tel Aviv’s shorelines accumulate some 21 kilograms (46 pounds) of plastic waste per day. In total, the report found, some 570,000 tonnes of plastic were put into the sea every year, which is the equivalent of 33,800 plastic bottles every minute.
Barcelona’s beaches see an estimated 26 kilograms and the Turkish beaches 31 kilograms per day.
The report names nine coastlines as the most polluted in the Mediterranean, the BBC said, including the shorelines of Alexandria, Algiers, Izmir, Marseilles, Valencia and Venice.
In the wake of the report, the WWF urged individual governments and the European Union as a whole to boost recycling and dramatically cut the amount of plastic it produces.
"Our plastic system is broken - all Mediterranean countries still fail to collect all their waste," the BBC quoted Giuseppe Di Carlo, the director of WWF Mediterranean Marine Initiative, as saying.
"Plastic production is far too cheap while its waste management and pollution costs are largely discharged on societies and nature," he said according to the BBC.
"All countries must overhaul their whole supply chain... This is the only way we can keep plastic out of the Mediterranean Sea."
