Dear Editor,
The Garden City has been my home for most of my life. I recall the drives to school with my children, sharing the latest school gossips and simply chitchatting about my business ventures. But I vividly remember the heaps of trash tainting the once beautiful Garden City into one of obnoxity.
I remember the way bus drivers, pedestrians, ‘druggies’ would litter without a care. I recall the mountains of waste on almost every street you turn, and the waste trailing into trenches and gutters. Strikingly, I recall little to nothing being done about it.
Garbage is everywhere, and suddenly we have decided that it is damaging. Until recently, waste enjoyed anonymity in ubiquity; we were so surrounded by it that we hardly noticed it. No one seemed to care enough to do anything about it. The general approach is to sit back and let it be someone else’s problem. This simpleminded attitude of witnessing an ill and doing nothing, part-taking, or just not having the slightest care in the world has been embedded in the minds of numerous people for years. “It is only one straw,” said 8 billion people.
Conferences have been held, protests have been happening, meetings with world leaders and business owners have been taking place, but is there any progress? At the COP26, I was blown away by the loads of ideas and projects that can decrease carbon emissions and aid in the global climate fight, but were any ideas actually implemented? We promise, but do we fulfil? We applaud those that recycle and share people’s DIY projects, but how are we actually doing our part in preserving the Earth?
The burden of litter clean-ups falls to local government organs or community groups. For years, numerous clean-up campaigns have been created, executed, and then failed. Why? Because of us. Unreservedly, I can say that the efforts of the Government and the numerous resources used do not matter. People simply do not care!
Littering is a disgusting side-effect of our convenience-oriented disposable culture. To underline the extent of the problem – and it does not stop there – once trash gets free, wind and weather move it from streets to waterways, and eventually rivers and oceans. One study found that 18% of litter ends up in rivers, streams, and oceans, resulting in trash islands like the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. Species are going extinct because of climate change. This is happening. It is not a theory or a hoax, it is not ‘it will happen,’ it has been happening, and will only get worse.
There is a worldwide revolt against plastic. In 2016, a Greenpeace petition for a UK-wide plastic ban hit 365,000 signatures in just four months, becoming the largest environmental petition ever presented to a government. The United Nations declared a “war” on single-use plastic.
It is time for Guyana to join this revolution and contribute to the fight against climate change.
Doing your part to keep litter to a minimum is easy, but it involves vigilance. For starters, do not let trash escape your car, and make sure household garbage bins are sealed tightly. Also, if that stretch of area you drive by every day is a haven for litter, offer to clean it and keep it clean.
Seeing how blessed our beautiful land truly is, it is time we take interest and care for our environment. We have to reduce, reuse, recycle, refill, repair, re-gift and repeat. It is time to implement more strict laws and consequences of littering and getting rid of waste. We, as a community, should unite and create more clean-up campaigns. But most importantly, it is crucial to note that it does not matter how much we clean, because the waste would still be dumped at a landfill. The only way to thwart this is to reduce the non-biodegradable garbage on landfills (items such as plastic, cardboard, glass, metals). Perhaps Guyana, as a developing nation emerging and growing in the Oil & Gas Sector, should seek to implement different strategies of breaking down and getting rid of waste in non-harmful ways.
Many people do not feel the urgency, or would hesitate at the initial cost of transitioning our energy infrastructure, without considering the cost of inaction. Many fail to grasp how dependent humanity really is on intact ecosystems. When racism, politics and bigotry are mixed, it becomes near impossible. But the earth does not belong to us, we belong to the earth.
Respectfully,
Nazar Mohamed
Businessman
