Palmy’s Plastic Pollution – Launch event

Plastic pollution is an urgent global issue on the cusp of constituting ‘planetary boundary threat’. This issue is being explored locally by a community engaged ‘living labs’ research initiative supported by Massey University.

A citizen science approach is being facilitated by the Environmental Network Manawatu (ENM) with the support of PNCC, MRLF and Iwi. The immediate aim is to benchmark all forms of plastic pollution, at the unit level of a ‘City’ and to then draw on this information and relational network to develop and implement a community-based plastic pollution strategy.

The vision is that this learning will enable this initiative to grow from the ‘City’ scale to a ‘whole of regional catchment’ model and to form a new contribution to the ‘Source to Sea’ programme (See: https://enm.org.nz/about/biodiversity) and the ongoing work of the Manawatu River Leaders Forum (See: https://www.manawaturiver.co.nz/).

This presentation will outline some the background to the issue of plastic pollution in a New Zealand context, briefly outline the origins, contributors & research theory underwriting this project, explore the concept of benchmarking and addressing plastic pollution on city, regional, national and international scales and will illustrate the early stage action learning approach and outcomes to date.