Cape Town – UCT PhD student Takunda Chitaka’s approach to the issue of plastic marine pollution has seen her receive the 2019 Excellence in Academia PETCO Award.
Chitaka, a student in the Department of Chemical Engineering at the university, is the first recipient of the award, which recognises the importance of having peer-reviewed research underpinning strategic interventions into the broad areas of recycling, waste minimisation and sustainability.
Since 2016 Chitaka has been gaining an understanding of the marine plastic waste situation, based on empirical evidence which was something she found lacking in the discussion about potential solutions.
She used a beach accumulation survey to estimate the litter flows into the marine environment.
“I looked at five beaches and found one had around 36 items per 100m per day, and another had 3 000 items.
"Another important thing I noticed was how the composition of the litter has changed. A mitigation approach focused on items associated with food consumed on the go may address a third to a half of marine litter sources in Cape Town,” said Chitaka.
Through her scientific study on plastic, Chitaka determined the litter wash-up rates for five beaches, and classified 36 000 items by weight into 372 distinct item types across 10 material types and 19 functional type categories.
“On day one, you clean the beach of all the litter. The next day you return and pick up all the litter again, which gives you 24 hours of litter that has washed up onto the beach.
“Academically this is generally acknowledged to be a good proxy of what is flowing into the ocean.
"Ten years ago, everyone was concerned about plastic bags. In my litter collection, I found very few plastic bags across all the beaches.
"Lots of polystyrene packaging, snack packets and straws were found,” Chitaka said.
Chitaka said she strongly believed through the use of science, corporate brands and other plastic producers could address the environmental problems faced today.
The paper on her project was published on the Elsevier platform.
Elsevier is a global information analytics business that helps institutions and professionals progress in science, advance healthcare and improve performance.
“I don’t believe that research needs to stay behind ivory towers or is simply meant for journals. For my work to be recognised by Petco means that they have seen my research and I have communicated with them,” said Chitaka.
Apart from her prize, she will get to choose a recycling initiative to contribute to.
“This is a very tough industry to get into. I want to work with an organisation that is truly passionate about recycling and waste collecting and help empower and uplift them through this.
"I believe most people want to recycle, but there are not enough facilities to meet that demand.
"My hope for my research is that it helps to inform the way forward for the plastics economy in South Africa” Chitaka said.