Data collected from almost 12,000 locations between 2005 and 2019 confirmed that the amount of plastic being found in net samples rocketed from an average estimate of 0.22million tons, to 2.33 million tons. Published in the journal Plos One and quoted in the London times in March 2023, Marcus Eriksson the co-founder of the Five Gyres Institute who led this study announced, “ we found an alarming trend of exponential growth of micro plastics in the global ocean since the millennium.”

This research comes as governments scramble to negotiate a new global plastic treaty by 2024, with nations divided on the approach. Remarkably, the US favours countries deciding their own targets, while the UK, European Union and others favour a tougher phase out. Ericsson worked with teams at Australian, US, European and south American universities to collect previously unpublished data, and existing scientific literature, to estimate the number and weight of small plastic pieces in the world’s seas. They concluded that there are between 82 trillion and 358 trillion particles in our oceans. That’s between 1.1 million and 4.9 million tons of plastic waste floating in our seas.

It is our opinion that we cannot go on like this, especially as micro plastics are being found in the fish that we eat. Scientists have warned that unless things change, the amount of plastic entering the oceans will increase 2.6 times when we reach 2040. It is for this reason at SkinLikes that we have decided that we have to play our part to put a stop to all of this.

The tubes that we have been using for several products came from plastic that was produced from sugar cane waste. It is recyclable, and we hope that every tube sold has gone through the recycling process. But as there is no certainty in this, we have changed all the containers that we currently use. We have a small supply of tubes for Joint Ease and Skin Repair (our top selling products) and we will continue to use these until they are exhausted, but other than this we will move to using glass and aluminium.

Our clean alternatives: Male and female deodorant’s in a glass bottle with a plastic cap. Once separated, the different parts are recyclable. Persian Silk Moisturiser and Rejuvenating Lotion have a glass bottle and a plastic lotion pump. Separated and washed, these are recyclable. We will sell all other products in containers manufactured from aluminium. We internally coat these with a food-grade micro-thickness. Aluminium is the most readily available metal in the world and is recyclable forever. The labels on the bottles are peelable and go to plastic recycling. None of the products that we sell can float in the sea. So, perhaps it’s time for the larger cosmetic companies to follow our lead. We hope you will agree.

In the last 12 months, we worked with our designers and engineers to produce an aluminium lotion pump. The problem is that there isn’t anyone in the world manufacturing such a product, and the cost of tooling is currently beyond our reach. Our next challenge is to develop an aluminium housing and roller ball for deodorants. Then we can eliminate plastic completely.

Please call our office on 0800 023 6252 if you have questions.

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