By Godwin Oritse
THE Managing Director of APM Terminals Apapa, Martin Jacob, has made a case for the proper disposal and recycling of plastics in order to reduce harmful effect on the ocean, wildlife and humans.
Disclosing this during a cleanup, organised by APM Terminals Apapa in partnership with Wecyclers at the Ogogoro Island, a riverine community in Apapa, Lagos as part of the company’s 2018 “Go Green” campaign, Jacob said no fewer than 120 employees of the company, Wecyclers volunteers and residents of the community took part in the cleaning exercise; collecting trash and other litters from the shoreline of the island.
Mr. Jacob who said a total 228 kilograms of waste was collected at the end of the exercise added: “Go Green” is a worldwide campaign set up by a number of leading container terminal operators and port authorities, with the aim of raising awareness of the global natural and social environment and improving conditions in these areas.
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“The campaign is carried out annually through volunteer activities such as creating and upgrading local green spaces, launching educational programmes, adopting waste recycling measures and community engagement.”
He said: “In Nigeria, very often you see the whole place flooded. This is all because of the plastic bottles we throw in the drains. So we just want to spread the message among our communities and also our employees to inculcate the culture of disposing plastic waste in a proper manner, in other words, recycle it.
“We can’t stop using plastics. Plastic nowadays has become part of our lives. Even if you buy chocolate in the supermarket, they give nylon and you accept it and that is the reason we find it everywhere. This in turn causes more damage to our environment. Plastic gives us a lot of benefits but careless usage is what is giving us the problem we face today.”
“There are islands of plastic bottles floating around the ocean. Depending on how we handle plastics, we can avoid the dangers in our environment. So this is not just going to be a one-day thing for us, it is what we should take home, at work and in our families. We have spread the culture, so this should become a movement to prevent abuse of plastic.”
One of the leaders of the Ogogoro Island community, Alade Isaiah, expressed appreciation to APM Terminals for taking up the clean up exercise, even as he urged other port operators to emulate the good gesture of the leading port operator.
“We love what APM Terminals has done by cleaning our environment. Our women and children have also supported them in this cleaning exercise. We will emulate this fine example by keeping our environment clean so that the dirt around do not go inside the water” he said.
Source: https://www.vanguardngr.com/2018/10/apm-terminals-apapa-raise-concerns-over-plastic-pollution/
