Welcome
plastic pollution: Still not solved after 50 years
Science, Marketing, Economics
Rethinking Public Engagement
The Big Problem
Despite 50 years of dedicated efforts to curb plastic pollution, the crisis continues to worsen. Billions of people worldwide rely on plastic, and a fraction flows into the oceans constantly. Scientists, governments, and NGOs have been entrusted to solve this pressing issue. However, a 2020 review by over 23 scientists revealed that even the most aggressive interventions may fall short as plastic production is set to increase. This poses a significant challenge. In response, scientists have turned to the private sector for help (Lau et al. 2020). Our interpretation: plastic is an entrenched part of our lives, and without immediate reduction strategies, a circular economy model may prove insufficient.
Our Plan
High-Up Research Informed Marketing Functions: Though widespread awareness and concern about plastic pollution exist, behavioral inconsistencies indicate public confusion about how to help. The analysis informed development of a high-up marketing design that informs downstream marketing functions.
Scope: Our Approach Goes Beyond Litter: While public engagement media focuses on reducing single-use plastics and litter, we expanded our scope to address macro, micro, and nano-sized plastics.
How We Solve It: We identified the point of greatest opportunity cost to disrupt the conveyance of plastic debris from land into rivers and oceans at the least economic cost to governments to mitigate. We tied it to a global business opportunity. The specifics of our strategy are proprietary at this time.
Whitepaper
Whitepaper: Our proprietary whitepaper, co-authored by entrepreneur, patented inventor, and marketing researcher Suzette Mehler, and environmental economist and Earth scientist, Jim Levine, Ph.D., outlines the rationale, purpose, and execution plans for a for-profit impact corporation. Our branded business model uses the marketplace to engage consumers directly, synergizing actionable convenience with compelling licensed media messaging, patentable product inventions for the mass market, an e-commerce site to test messaging and products, and eco-entertainment with a new spin on the big picture of plastic distribution and how people can protect themselves and the environment, for release on video streaming services.
Strategic Collaboration: In a meta-analysis of the plastic pollution landscape, we developed a “new paradigm” capable of reshaping the understanding and approach to mitigate plastic pollution. This transformative shift led us to address a global void in public leadership by merging the power of a critical mass with the marketplace, endeavoring to slow “uncontrolled” plastic emissions.
Our unexpected solution is meticulously outlined in a comprehensive whitepaper proposing a private-sector, global brand business model with multiple product extensions. Now it is time to propel our project from its nascent stages to a position of global recognition.
We seek a co-founder(s) with experience in finance, distribution and building a global brand. Contact Suzette at SuzetteMehler@WorldHarmoni.com to learn more.
Why Private-Sector, For-Profit
Plastic pollution has a growing body of research documenting harms and its insidious reach into ecosystems. Reviewing viable scenarios to solve plastic pollution, even with aggressive measures such as Circularity, scientists in two 2020 studies forecast annual plastic emissions will increase to 53 million MT by 2030 (Borelle et al., 2020) and 710 million M.T. of cumulative plastic will enter all ecosystems by 2040 (Lau et al., 2020); both studies call for an urgent response from the private sector to employ an economically solution.
The challenges faced by governments and non-profit organizations in addressing issues like plastic pollution are multifaceted and complex, to include:
- Sovereign Constraints: Governments must stop at their borders to address borderless plastic distribution.
- Resource Constraints: Non-profits often operate with limited resources compared to for-profit entities. This can restrict their ability to invest in large-scale advertising and marketing campaigns.
- Regulatory Restrictions: Non-profits are subject to specific regulations and restrictions, including limitations on political lobbying and advocacy.
- Public Awareness and Perception: Non-profits may struggle to change public behavior and perceptions, particularly when competing against well-funded marketing to buy products.
- Scale of the Problem: Issues like plastic pollution are global in scale and require coordinated efforts from multiple sectors, including government, business, and civil society.
However, we build upon the foundation laid by non-profits. They play a crucial role in raising awareness, advocating for policy changes, conducting vital research, and implementing waste management projects.
Findings & Benefits
The Intersection Point: Our proposed paradigm offers a middle-ground solution that satisfies environmentalists and business, with the potential to slow plastic emissions as Zero Waste and Circularity manifest. We identified an intersection point for the ideal strategy that could slow global plastic pollution.
Project benefits include:
- A synergistic plan that could disrupt land-based plastic tonnage flows into terrestrial, riverine, and ocean ecosystems, achieving the most significant reductions in High-Income and Upper-Middle-Income Countries within two to five years.
- A scaled plan to achieve a critical mass of human participation that could cascade to a global scale.
- A private-sector, for-profit business model and marketing strategy to amplify price and scale efficiencies for fast deployment and greatest impact.
- An effort that is not dependent on plastic value.
- Monitoring technology would be developed to measure regional and global campaign success in real-time data, and fill measurment knowledge gaps by collecting elusive global terrestrial plastic pollution data.
- It scales with world population growth, corporate expansion into new international markets, and anticipated increases in virgin plastic production.
- It is a-political and non-adversarial to business to avert delays from special interest groups.
- It could be a candidate for extended producer responsibility (EPR), which producers might welcome because of the public relations aspect.
- It reduces plastic pollution in the immediate future as permanent solutions come to fruition.