Happy Earth Day !
Updated: Apr 19, 2018
Have you been wondering why you are seeing more posts and ads about pollution and environmental protection on the internet this month? That is because April 22 is Earth Day. And yes, you’ll be reading one more blog about Earth Day as Sumatra Weave would like to dedicate this post to the day that honors our mother earth.
So, what is Earth Day?
Earth Day is an annual event celebrated on April 22 worldwide to diversify, educate, and activate the environmental movement worldwide. More than 50,000 partners working in nearly 196 countries together to build environmental democracy. In fact, more than 1 billion people now participate in Earth Day activities each year, making it the largest civic observance in the world.
Here is a brief history about Earth Day.
In 1970, the United States Senator Gaylord Nelson founded Earth Day as a “national teach-in on the environment” after witnessing the ravages of the 1969 massive oil spill in Santa Barbara, California killing over 10,000 seabirds, dolphins, seals, and sea lions. The first Earth Day was held on April 22, 1970 and activated 20 million Americans from all walks of life to demonstrate for a healthy, sustainable environment in massive coast-to-coast rallies.
While the day was focused only in the US, the original national coordinator in 1970, Denis Hayes, took it international in 1990 mobilizing 200 million people in 141 countries and lifting environmental issues onto the world stage. Earth Day 1990 gave a huge boost to recycling efforts worldwide and helped oil the wheels for the 1992 United Nations Earth Summit in Rio De Janeiro.
2000 was the first year that Earth Day used the Internet as its principal organizing tool. The event was a huge success, enlisting more than 5,000 environmental groups outside the US, reaching hundreds of millions of people in a record 183 countries. Leornardo DiCaprio was the official host for the event.
Now, let’s fast forward and come back to 2018. The theme for Earth Day this year is to End Plastic Pollution. 
Below are some facts about single-use plastics:
1. More than 1 million bags are used every minute and only 1% of plastic bags are returned for recycling.
2. A plastic bag has an average “working life” of 15 minutes.
3. Humans buy about 1,000,000 plastic bottles per minute in total.
4. Half a million straws are used in the world every day.
5. 500 billion disposable cups are consumed every year.
6. The main cause for the increase in plastic production is plastic packaging.
In case you want to learn more about the plastic items you consume every year, here’s a super-cool calculator to calculate YOUR PLASTIC CONSUMPTION!
https://www.earthday.org/plastic-calculator/
Share your green tips on reducing plastic consumption with us and win a chance for your tip to be featured on Sumatra Weave homepage!
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