{"id":6871,"date":"2019-11-28T09:22:42","date_gmt":"2019-11-28T06:22:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/africasustainabilitymatters.com\/?p=6871"},"modified":"2026-01-11T05:30:43","modified_gmt":"2026-01-11T05:30:43","slug":"nigerian-river-snails-carry-more-microplastics-than-rhine-snails","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/2019\/11\/28\/nigerian-river-snails-carry-more-microplastics-than-rhine-snails\/","title":{"rendered":"Nigerian River Snails Carry More Microplastics Than Rhine Snails"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>By Emmanuel O. Akindele<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Plastic pollution is a serious environmental menace. A\nrecent United Nations Environment Programme&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.unenvironment.org\/interactive\/beat-plastic-pollution\/\">report<\/a>&nbsp;indicates\nthat there could be more individual plastic items than fish in the oceans by\n2050.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">People continue to find ways of using plastic because it is\neasily shaped and lasts a long time. The world\u2019s plastic production&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/ourworldindata.org\/plastic-pollution\">currently stands<\/a>&nbsp;at\nabout 380 million tonnes a year. That also means there has been a&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.unenvironment.org\/interactive\/beat-plastic-pollution\/\">surge<\/a>&nbsp;in\nplastic pollution.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Nigeria, whose population has been predicted to be&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.voanews.com\/africa\/nigerias-population-projected-double-2050\">the\nthird largest<\/a>&nbsp;in the world by 2050, uses&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/ourworldindata.org\/plastic-pollution\">0.85 million metric tonnes <\/a>&nbsp;a\nyear and in 2010 accounted for 2.67% of the world\u2019s&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/ourworldindata.org\/plastic-pollution#determinants-of-mismanaged-waste\">mismanaged\nplastic waste<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Environmental&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.unenvironment.org\/interactive\/beat-plastic-pollution\/\">researchers<\/a>&nbsp;are\nfinding that pollution produced in one environment finds its way to others via\nrivers and oceans. It also finds its way into&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/ourworldindata.org\/plastic-pollution#determinants-of-mismanaged-waste\">food\nchains<\/a>, including food that people eat. Plastics greater than 5mm in size \u2013\nmacroplastics \u2013 are often broken down into smaller pieces \u2013 microplastics. This\noften happens through ingestion and digestion by animals.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.sciencedirect.com\/science\/article\/pii\/S0075951119300970\">In\nthe first study of its kind<\/a>, my research group investigated microplastic\npollution in the Osun River system in Nigeria. We did this by testing for\nmicroplastics in gastropods, commonly known as snails. We found fibre was the\nmost common microplastic in the species. This is the first chemical\nidentification of polymer types in African freshwater invertebrates.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">To provide a comparison we also researched microplastics in\na gastropod species in the Rhine River, an international river with economic\nimportance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Our findings revealed the presence of microplastics in both\nrivers, with higher microplastic load per individual in the African gastropods.\nPolyethylene, nylon and polypropylene plastic types, which are commonly being used\nas shopping bags and bottle caps, were recorded in the study.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Our findings provide insights into the differences between a\ndeveloped nation that has good waste management practices and a developing\nnation with poor waste management practices.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><a href=\"https:\/\/theconversation.com\/nigerian-river-snails-carry-more-microplastics-than-rhine-snails-126622\">Read\nmore\u2026<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Emmanuel O. Akindele Plastic pollution is a serious environmental menace. A recent United Nations Environment Programme&nbsp;report&nbsp;indicates that there could be more individual plastic items than fish in the oceans&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":6873,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":"","pagelayer_contact_templates":[],"_pagelayer_content":"","_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[101],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6871","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-international-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6871","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6871"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6871\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6873"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6871"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6871"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6871"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}