This speech was written by Kiri (age 10) from KCC Tauranga
Did you know about the tiny little plastics that get shipped around the world every single year?
They are the worst form of plastic for sea life. They are called plastic nurdles, and they are used to make all the different kinds of plastic things – like lunch boxes, drink bottles and wheelie bins.
Every year there is about 230,000 tonnes of nurdles lost into the sea – that is 10 trillion nurdles – because they are so small!
Nurdles get lost when they’re getting packaged or moved by forklifts, or even when they’re in a container and it falls off a container ship. Then they can cause problems.
Because they look like fish eggs, and float in the water, the fish, seabirds and other sea mammals gobble them up. Their tummies get so full of nurdles that they stop eating, and they starve to death! Nurdles have been found in the stomachs of over 220 different kinds of animals.
Around here, the most well-known place to find nurdles is at Waihi Beach because the current brings them there.
How I know about these bad little plastics is from KCC – that stands for Kiwi Conservation Club. We were doing a beach clean up at Waihi Beach and they told us how bad they were.
So if you are walking along any beach, please can you look out for these little pieces of plastic. Sometimes it’s not the big rubbish that is the problem.
