World Oceans Day Rally Thursday 8th June 1-2pm Parliament Steps, Victoria

On World Oceans Day, Victorians will flock in the hundreds to Parliament House Steps.

Drummers will play in an atmosphere of anticipation for those who call for reducing ocean pollution. Two majestic whale puppets, a sperm whale and a humpback whale will swim amongst and breach high above the heads of the crowd, who hold up a mass of single use plastic bags.

The Victorian Parliament will soon be making a decision that will directly affect us in this state.

Earlier that morning, the report from the parliamentary inquiry into Nina Springle’s bill to ban plastic bags, microbeads and excessive grocery packaging will be handed down.
“Victoria lags behind every other state in Australia and much of the rest of the world in policy on tackling the global crisis of marine plastic pollution. Today, on World Oceans Day, we are calling on the Victorian Parliament to be leaders in taking action on the global crisis of marine plastic pollution. We are calling on the Victorian Parliament to be bold and brave in implementing decisive actions that will turn the tide on plastic pollution in Victoria. ” Robert Skehan, Plastic Bag Free Victoria

Plastic Bag Free Victoria collected 10,000 signatories prior to the bill being tabled and are now waiting on the government’s decision.

“Children and adults in communities throughout Victoria that I have spoken to in the thousands, are absolutely mystified as to why the government hasn’t acted to ban single use plastic bags”
Anthony Hill, Plastic Pollution Solutions

Tens of thousands of Australians have been speaking to and learning alongside Anthony Hill. Throughout his three years on the road, he has run hundreds of school and community sessions, trivia and film screening nights and corporate presentations on the very issue of plastics pollution and what we can do about it.

“Successive Victorian governments have done less than all other states to turn the tide on marine plastic pollution. The Boomerang Alliance is here to work with our allies and any other groups to change that. We will continue to lobby for legislation that reduces litter, increases recycling and minimises the catastrophic impact our waste has on our oceans.” Annett Finger, Boomerang Alliance

Representatives from Plastic Bag Free Victoria, Sea Shepherd Marine Debris Australia, Beach Patrol and the Boomerang Alliance will address the crowds, while banners of key facts and quotes are held up above them, signalling the end of ignorance on plastic pollution for us, our oceans and the land.

“In the year and a half since Sea Shepherd Australia launched our national Marine Debris Campaign together we have achieved some amazing results: removed over half a million pieces of potential and lethal marine debris weighing 14 tonnes.” Sea Shepherd Australia
In a showing of solidarity across the sectors, Roy Palmer Chairman of The Association of International Seafood Professionals is promoting the need to stop pollution at its source. As a global association, he represents over 70,000 members of the seafood industry community.

“For our Industry, the Ocean is our workplace so it just makes sense for us to be seen to be a leader in this area” Roy Palmer, Chairman of The Association of International Seafood Professionals

THE EVENT HAS BEEN A COLLABORATION OF MANY ORGANISATIONS WHO HAVE WORKED HARD FOR YEARS
Link to the Facebook event is here.

WHEN: Thursday 8th of June, 1 pm – 2 pm
WHERE: Steps of the Victorian Parliament, Spring St, Melbourne

www.boomerangalliance

• AISP Join Boomerang Alliance Community Rally

To celebrate World Oceans Day (8 June) AISP will be joining the Boomerang Alliance Community Rally on the steps of Victorian Parliament, Spring Street, Melbourne between 1 & 2 PM to support the ‘Ban the Plastic Bag’ campaign.

Since we were involved in the Plastic & Polystyrene Symposium held at NEAQ, Boston, Mass on 18 March we have been promoting awareness of the issue in many areas around the world. On one of those occasions we held a session ‘Wrapping it All Up’ at the Australian Seafood Summit at Foodservice Australia and from there we connected with the Boomerang Alliance.

We have established a Community of Practice (Plastic & Polystyrene Symposium Group – http://www.seafoodprofessionals.org/social/groups/viewgroup/48-plastic-polystyrene-symposium-group ) where anyone can share ideas and information.

Additionally, in December at the joint ISPIM/AISP Building the Innovation Century Summit being held at RMIT University Melbourne we are establishing a challenge for the delegates to engage in helping us in solving the ‘Wicked Problem of Plastic in the Ocean’.

At the Rally AISP’s Chairman, Roy Palmer, will thank the many volunteers who are engaged in collecting marine debris and litter in the various regions of Victoria. He will emphasize that whilst they do an excellent job the problem is that their hard labor is clearly a case of ‘shutting the gate after the horse has bolted’ as we need to stop the problem at the source!

In 2011, the United Nations Environmental Program described marine plastic pollution as a ‘toxic time bomb’ and it took until April 2016 for the Australian Senate Environment and Communications References Committee to eventually publish a report entitled ‘Toxic tide: the threat of marine plastic pollution in Australia’.

Roy will point out that sadly, Victoria, is showing little to no leadership in governing and managing the massive problem that plastic is creating in the oceans. Under the Victorian Fisheries Act 1995 one of the main objectives is to protect and conserve fisheries resources, habitats and ecosystems including the maintenance of aquatic ecological processes and genetic diversity and clearly our government are failing on this.

We need more from all our Governments in this fight to save the Oceans and, clearly, the time to act is now.

We believe we need a joint Government, Industry, NGO approach to engage plastic and polystyrene manufacturers and importers to create guidelines for all industries on packaging – what is and what is not acceptable. This could be aligned with information on what you can recycle and where you can recycle, thus creating a ‘How to Responsibly Manage Your Packaging’ approach.

This is such a massive issue that it needs every one of us to take some action to arrest the problem and that is why we are fully supporting the Boomerang Alliance in asking that the Victorian government take immediate and decisive action on the main avoidable sources of marine plastic pollution, as they have been identified in the 2016 Senate Inquiry, namely:

1. Ban single-use plastic bags (including biodegradable, degradable and oxo-degradable bags)
2. Ban microbeads (cosmetic and industrial use)
3. Curtail excess plastic packaging
4. Adopt a container deposit scheme (ideally harmonized with NSW and QLD)
5. Better enforce existing laws to prevent nurdle spills from industrial sites

It is evident that all of us – individually and collectively – need to educate ourselves about the issue and the potential solutions if we are to have any chance to turn the tide.
Annett Finger (Boomerang Alliance), Robert Skehan (Plastic Bag Free Victoria)