On a beach in the Philippines, barefoot children splashed and played on plastic sand washed up by previous typhoons.
Much of the world’s plastic waste ends up in rivers and eventually into the ocean. In the process, it is often ingested by fish, birds and other wildlife, such as three coots wading through plastic litter in a Serbian river.
Plastic is an incredibly versatile material that can be bent into endless shapes useful for everything from construction to packaging, but it’s also a scourge.
In South Korea, this is an issue that each country is trying to address. final round of negotiations A legally binding treaty aimed at resolving the issue is being concluded.
Its use has exploded over the past half century, and global production is expected to reach: 736 million tons by 2040It would have increased by 70% from 2020 without the policy change, according to the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development.
Children walk on plastic and other debris washed ashore from a previous typhoon along a Gulf Coast slum in Navotas province, Philippines, Tuesday, Nov. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Aaron Favila)
Nina Gomez collects discarded plastic bags from seawater near Copacabana Beach in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, on March 19, 2024. (AP Photo/Bruna Prado)
A rabbit wrapped in a plastic bag is on display for sale at a market in downtown Barcelona, Spain, Wednesday, November 27, 2024. (AP Photo/Emilio Morenatti)
Only about 9% of that is recycled, and much of the rest ends up in the world around us.
In Johannesburg, South Africa, volunteers were given the opportunity to clean up plastic waste in the Jukusei River after it was caught in a net.
In Jakarta, Indonesia, roadside trash was piled up so high that it threatened to spill into traffic. And in New Delhi’s slums, where every inch of the landscape seems to be covered with plastic waste, bags await sorting by collectors hoping to resell them.
In Saint-Marc, Haiti, a young boy watched the sunset from a perch surrounded by plastic and other trash.
A boy sits on a tire among trash at sunset on a beach in Saint-Marc, Haiti, Thursday, October 10, 2024. (AP Photo/Odelyn Joseph)
People store various waste items in plastic bags for separation on Tuesday, November 26, 2024 in New Delhi, India. (AP Photo/Manish Swarup)
Recycler Jorge Tejada fills bags with plastic bottles collected from garbage dumps and the street in Lima, Peru, on Tuesday, November 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Guadalupe Pardo)
Motorists pass by garbage, mostly plastic, piled up on the side of the road in Jakarta, Indonesia, Tuesday, Nov. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Dita Alankara)
Waste pickers Sarmah and Usman Shekh (right) search for recyclable materials during a heat wave at a garbage dump on the outskirts of Jammu, India, on Wednesday, June 19, 2024. (AP Photo/Chaney Anand)
Plastic waste stored at a recycling center in Frankfurt, Germany, Wednesday, November 27, 2024. (AP Photo/Michael Probst)
Volunteers from the Alexandra Water Warriors clean the Djuksey River in the heart of Alexandra township from plastic pollution on Wednesday, November 27, 2024 in Johannesburg, South Africa. (AP Photo/Jerome Delay)
On Wednesday, November 27, 2024, a plastic bottle is stuck in a bush in Valdemanco, a suburb of Madrid. (AP Photo/Bernat Armang)
People walk past plastic waste on the beach at Badwal Park on the Arabian Sea coast in Mumbai, India, on Tuesday, November 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Rajanish Kakade)
Coots float among discarded plastic bottles and waste on the banks of the Sava River in Belgrade, Serbia, on Tuesday, November 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Darko Vojinovic)
A man walks past floating waste in the Drina River near Visegrad, Bosnia, on January 10, 2024. (AP Photo/Armin Durgut)
Sanitation workers collect trash in the Brooklyn borough of New York City on Saturday, November 16, 2024. (AP Photo/Yuki Iwamura)
Recycling collectors work at the Lixao open dump in Santo Antonio do Descoberto, Goiás, Brazil, June 4, 2024. (AP Photo/Eraldo Peres)
Revelers stand near a pile of garbage near the bull run where the cattle from La Palmosilla ranch gather during the first day of the bull run at the San Fermín Fiesta in Pamplona, Spain, Sunday, July 7, 2024 (AP Photo/Alvaro Barrientos)
A pedestrian carries a plastic bag for takeaway food in Hong Kong, Wednesday, March 13, 2024. (AP Photo/Louise Delmotte)
A cow forages for food by a pond surrounded by plastic waste on Tuesday, November 26, 2024 in Hyderabad, India. (AP Photo/Mahesh Kumar A.)
A priest sits in the garbage left behind by devotees during the ‘Kuse Aungshi’ at Gokarneshwor temple in Kathmandu, Nepal, Monday, September 2, 2024. (AP Photo/Niranjan Shrestha)
A dog kennel is abandoned next to a landfill covered with discarded plastic material on Tuesday, November 26, 2024, in Asunción, Paraguay. (AP Photo/Jorge Saenz)
Bales of plastic waste stand in the courtyard of the InterZero plastic sorting facility on Wednesday, November 27, 2024 in Berlin, Germany. (AP Photo/Markus Schreiber)
A classic American car passes through trash in Havana, Cuba, September 24, 2024. (AP Photo/Ramon Espinosa)
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