What is Creating the Huge Garbage Patches in the Oceans?

Five (5)  major oceans , the Pacific, Atlantic, Artic, Indian and Southern oceans, cover 72% of the earth's surface.  Included within these oceans are more than fifty (50) seas comprising a division of the ocean(s) enclosed or partially enclosed by land. The body of law governing these oceans and seas is known as ocean law or the law of the sea.  

The United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea or UNCLOS is the key international treaty creating ocean law.  UNCLOS establishes the rights and responsibilities of all member nations, as to freedom of navigation, territorial boundaries of 12 miles, economic zones up to 200 miles, and rights to oil and gas on the ocean bed. Unfortunately, neither UNCLOS or other laws clearly and uniformly establish responsibility for polluting the oceans.  Worse yet, only 168 of the 195 countries in the world (excluding the US) are signatory to UNCLOS. This is problematic when it comes to responsibility for the creation and cleanup of the huge garbage patches in the oceans. 

There are five (5) enormous garbage patches in three of the five oceans, the Pacific, Atlantic and Indian, as well as multiple smaller garbage patches in oceans and seas.  The surface area and volume of these garbage patches is almost unimaginable. The largest of the five major garbage patches is located in the Pacific Ocean between Asia and South America. It covers approximately 620,000 square miles, or twice the size of Texas.  Studies show the trash caught in the five major garbage patches increases by approximately 17.6 Million tons each and every year.  These garbage patches are created by "gyres" or rotating currents similar to huge “whirlpools” that tend to collect objects in one location. “Gyres” in the northern hemisphere rotate in a clockwise fashion, while those in the Southern hemisphere rotate counter-clockwise.  

The visible objects collected within these “gyres” contain a wide variety of human trash and garage. Floating objects include fishing gear, containers, drums, woods, plastics, rubber, cloth and many other man-made materials. However, the trash visible on the surface, pales in comparison to the sunken trash impacting the marine life below.  The the vast majority of trash below the oceans surface, around 80%, is is believed to consist of billions of plastic particles, broken down by sunlight and wave action, ranging in size from microscopic to several inches.  This plastic trash is created by multiple sources, including: cigarette butts, food wrappers, beverage bottles, straws, cups and plates, bottle caps, and single-use bags.  And these plastics have unknown impacts upon the marine life who ingest them, as well as the human population consuming marine life ingesting these plastics. 

The primary sources of trash caught in these “gyres” originate from Asia, namely  China, Indonesia, the Philippines, Vietnam, Sri Lanka, and Thailand.  The other is Africa.  Studies show Asia dumps more plastic in the oceans than all other countries combined.  According to National Geographic, 80% of plastics in the oceans are estimated to come from land-based sources, with the remaining 20 percent coming from boats and other marine sources.  The land based sources feed plastics to the oceans via major rivers in Asia and Africa. Not surprisingly, eight of the top ten rivers feeding plastics into the oceans are in Asia, with the other two in Africa.  Major inroads into ridding the oceans of garbage patches could be made if Asia and Africa simply filtered the plastics from their rivers before they reach the oceans.   

But, UNCLOS is silent as to responsibility for polluting the oceans and contributing to the worlds garbage patches.  Unless and until laws protecting the oceans  are enacted to avoid pollution by major contributors, including  Asia and Africa,   garbage patches in the oceans will continue to grow, marine life will continue to be subjected to plastics, and seafood will continue to have unknown impacts on the human population.