The Plastic discussion

On the 27th of March FFN Academy hosted the plastic discussion in the living room at THUIS in Wageningen. Six young people involved in initiatives to reduce plastic waste were invited to speak to and engage with the audience. All speakers were previous students or young professionals who are very passionate and are coming up with innovate ideas and methods that attempt to tackle the problem in different ways. We aimed for an evening that engaged the audience and tried to form a coherent storyline of the issue and consider how we can coordinate together to solve it.

We covered a broad variety of subjects at different scales. These included personal research into plastic pollution in the oceans, development of citizen science, a social enterprise geared towards local plastic recycling in the heart of Wageningen and evaluations into the claimed sustainability of Wageningen University. Halfway through the talks there was a break to enjoy the snacks and drinks (plastic free of course!). During this time it was clear that the audience was already very excited to start the discussion. Everyone was welcome to chip in and share their concerns, experiences and knowledge with regards to plastic, its use and the way it pollutes our world. It was very interesting to see how people disagreed as to how to solve the problem. The evening was successfully concluded after almost an hour long discussion in which many points of view were addressed.