Every year, there’s an estimated 14 million pounds of trash dumped into Earth’s beautiful oceans. The garbage that lingers in our waters is not only toxic to sea life, especially if consumed, but turtles, fish, and other marine critters are known to accidentally get entangled in the trash we irresponsibly dump.
One company, 4ocean, is one non-profit that’s focused on cleaning our polluted, trashed seas. The organization is primarily known for selling their famous 4ocean bracelets made out of recycled materials, so they can continue to perform their voluntary work. When a single purchase of one of their many eco-friendly products is made, 4ocean claims that they will remove one pound of trash from the ocean. The company just informed that since being founded on January 4, 2017, they have collected nearly eight million pounds of trash!
Currently, 4ocean is focusing on cleaning up the waters near Bali, Haiti, and Florida and hopes to reach their eight million pound goal as soon as possible.
Founders Andrew Cooper and Alex Schulze also recently expanded their operations to Central America after learning about the massive trash crisis they’ve been dealing with. With few infrastructures and many rivers connected to Central American oceans, the flow of trash is persistent. Not to mention, it’s estimated that at this time, there’s 10+ million pieces of trash floating in these waters.
“Expanding our cleanup operations into Central America offers us an opportunity to create significant change in the ocean plastic crisis,” said Schulze. “Our plan is to not only remove millions of pounds of plastic by leveraging innovative cleanup technologies but to also stop plastic pollution at its source by working with local communities to change plastic consumption habits.”
To aid with Central America’s oceans, 4ocean plans to add over 20 local members to their team. With their expanded helpers along with six boats that automatically pick up trash, 4ocean anticipates that their latest project will be a success. Thanks to these special vessels, the organization will be able to remove vast amounts of garbage in a matter of minutes!
But 4ocean needs your help. They’re only able to continue doing good things for our oceans when customers purchase from their online store. Besides bracelets, 4ocean also sells tumblers, 100% organic cotton apparel, and reusable shopping bags and travel straws.
Learn more about 4ocean’s mission below. And make sure to check on 4ocean’s progress here to see how many pounds of trash they’ve currently removed from oceans!
