Suffolk councillor warns of dangers of plastic pollution
Greenpeace is campaigning for people to take physical notes of how much plastic they are using for a week
Plastic pollution is an ongoing problem and Greenpeace is campaigning for people to take physical notes of how much plastic they are using.
Rachel Smith-Lyte is a Green Party councillor in Suffolk and explains why she feels this is important: "It's important because we're poisoning lots of wildlife that we share the planet words. And we're also poisoning ourselves."
Rachel did some research, and found a report from CNN, and the Guardian Paper from February earlier this year, that said 'Australians are ingesting a credit cards worth of plastic a week.'
She told us that littering leads to plastics making its way to the sea "these plastics are breaking down into smaller and smaller pieces.
"And then that's why they're then being eaten by the food chain such as fish and shellfish, which a lot of us are then eating.
"I don't think if you're vegetarian or vegan that you're going to be able to avoid it entirely though, because there's a say according to this report, it's in drinking water."
Rachel had a positive view towards Greenpeace's campaign, the Big Plastic Count.
"The more people that do that, the better the bigger picture that they can build up once they've got the results in from everybody at the end of the week
"When you record them online and they'll (Greenpeace) then have a much bigger and better picture of how much plastic we're buying and then throwing away.
"I think this is something that's certainly educational and it's something that all the family, people if they've got children can definitely get involved with this.
"I think they might enjoy it. They could take it into their school at the end of the week and show the class what they've been chucking out.
" I think it will give people a real sort of feel for how much they're getting through.
"The really important part is the citizen science side of it.
"When these when people's results get fed back, Greenpeace and Co. can then start crunching the numbers and and let us all know what the results are.
"And then they can go back to the supermarket as the packaging firms etcetera, etcetera say, right, we've noticed a lot of these things.
"In particular the plastic that can't be recycled. We're using far too much of this. What are the alternatives?"
Rachel has been taking part in the campaign herself and she is already thinking about changes she can make in order to reduce her use of plastic, she hopes more people will have the same reaction, but also thinks more people should sign up.
"When I looked I got my pack. I think it was about nearly 200,000 people signed up to do this, but we need more than that.
"Greenpeace are going to be looking for a lot more than that to get accurate picture as possible."