Month: March 2022

SEAQUAL® INITIATIVE is a community with a single voice against plastic pollution. SEAQUAL® brings together individuals, organizations, and companies, to help clean the oceans, raise awareness of the issue of marine plastic, and highlight the heroes who are working to solve it.

A SINGLE VOICE AGAINST PLASTIC POLLUTION

OCEAN CLEANING SEAQUAL®

INITIATIVE WORKS WITH OCEAN CLEAN-UPS AROUND THE WORLD, TO BRING VALUE TO THE WASTE THEY RECOVER

Worldwide, there are a growing number of ocean clean-ups working hard to retrieve marine litter from our oceans, beaches, rivers, and estuaries. Ocean clean-ups can be anything from small groups of local volunteers, all the way through to large international programs. They can be one-off beach clean-ups or involve whole communities of fishermen retrieving waste on a regular basis. These ocean clean-ups collect all types of waste; plastics, metals, glass, rubber, and mixed material items – everything from shoes to refrigerators! Because mixed waste is expensive to recycle, in the past much of this waste was destined for landfills or incineration. SEAQUAL® INITIATIVE is dedicated to giving a second life to this material. At SEAQUAL® INITIATIVE we don’t look for materials to recycle, we recycle the materials we find.

This mixed waste is sorted into different material types; materials such as metals and glass are recycled through traditional routes, while organic material and other non-plastics are recycled or disposed of responsibly. Marine plastics are harder to recycle. Although plastics can survive in the ocean for hundreds of years, UV rays, saltwater, and friction mean they can degrade quickly. SEAQUAL® INITIATIVE is dedicated to giving a new life to all types of marine plastic. The types of plastics found and the ratio of plastics to other materials depend upon many factors, including the type of ocean clean-up, the region, and the season. Typically, beach clean-ups have higher percentages of plastics, because the waste has been carried there by the tides; for example, PET water bottles may represent 40% of waste collected on some beaches, but only 5-10% of the waste collected from the ocean floor by fishermen.

SEAQUAL INITIATIVE: LOCAL SOLUTIONS TO A GLOBAL PROBLEM

Today, all transformation of marine plastic by SEAQUAL® INITIATIVE takes place in Europe. This marine plastic has been retrieved by ocean clean-ups in Europe, the Mediterranean, and the west coast of Africa. SEAQUAL® INITIATIVE recognizes the importance of providing local solutions to global problems and markets. For that reason, SEAQUAL® INITIATIVE is preparing to transform locally retrieved marine litter from local organizations at strategic locations around the world, starting with Asia and Central and North America. SEAQUAL® INITIATIVE is committed to supporting local communities to improve their waste management and recycling infrastructure.

UPCYCLED MARINE PLASTIC IS A NEW, FULLY TRACEABLE RAW MATERIAL WITH THE POWER TO RAISE AWARENESS OF THE ISSUE OF MARINE LITTER AND HIGHLIGHT THOSE HELPING TO FIGHT IT

Marine litter from our beaches found on the ocean floor and surface, or entering our oceans via rivers and estuaries is collected by clean-up programs. It is then sorted into different material types. The plastic portion is cleaned and transformed into Upcycled Marine Plastic at SEAQUAL® INITIATIVE approved facilities. It is then returned to the industry to be transformed into beautiful, new, sustainable products. Transforming marine litter into Upcycled Marine Plastic: Prevents marine litter from being sent to landfills or incinerated Creates awareness of the problem of marine litter Gives visibility to those people and organizations helping to clean our oceans

Museo Salvatore Ferragamo, Palazzo Spini Feroni, Firenze

12 April 2019 – 8 March 2020

The term “sustainability”, according to the 1987 Brundtland Report, defines the capacity of man to “satisfy the needs of the present generation without compromising the possibility that future generations will be able to satisfy their own “, that is, it represents one a condition of development capable of ensuring a quality of life of not less than the current one.

Numerous artists are looking at sustainability, some focusing on recovering our relationship with nature, the use of organic materials, the need for creative re-use of materials, or relations between nature and technology, while others are looking at the importance of a collective commitment to refounding society overall. Museo Salvatore Ferragamo presents the exhibition “Sustainable Thinking”, created to make people reflect on these themes.

Villani Leonello’s cork fabric has been selected to participate in this exhibition and the artist Paola Anziché made a suspended sculpture using the cork fabric with a clever concentric weaving that enhances the characteristics of the fiber.

Cork is a natural material obtained from cork oak and has been used for over two thousand years. It is mainly found in the Mediterranean; and in Italy, especially, in Sardinia and Sicily. It has excellent thermal and acoustic insulation properties, is water- and fire-resistant, and is naturally biodegradable. Cork can be reused several times through non-invasive processes.

It is estimated that cork forests absorb 14 million tons of CO2 per year and contribute to reducing the number of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere and slowing down global warming. Cork is able to retain approximately twice its weight of CO2. An excellent example of the circular economy.