Last updated 19:28, June 12 2018
KENDALL HUTT/STUFF
In a handwritten letter to Stuff, young Maddie Barr asks "other people in the world" to use paper straws in place of plastic ones.
In a handwritten letter to Stuff, young Maddie Barr asks "other people in the world" to use paper straws in place of plastic ones.
A child's plea for the world to turn the tide on plastic, contained in a cute, handwritten letter, has politicians agreeing New Zealand needs to stop using plastic straws.
Maddie Barr, from Mairangi Bay on Auckland's North Shore, wrote a letter to Stuff asking people to use paper straws instead of plastic ones.
It read: "Dear other pepile in the wirld, You need to stop uosing plastik stros and uos paper stros. Love Madeline" [sic].
The letter, which included a drawing of a, no doubt electric, car and a house on a hill, had Minister for Climate Change, James Shaw, agreeing New Zealand needed to stop using plastic straws.
Fellow Green Party MP, Eugenie Sage, who has been working on ways New Zealand can reduce and one day eliminate plastic waste from the environment as Associate Minister for the Environment, agreed with Shaw.
Young Maddie Barr has called on the "other people in the world" to stop using plastic straws, 541 million of which are used every year according to 2017 figures, and use paper straws instead.
"I share Maddie Barr's concern about plastic pollution in the environment and I encourage New Zealanders to follow her advice and try to use fewer single-use plastic products."
Although the Ministry for the Environment was establishing a taskforce to focus on action in response to China's restrictions on the import of recyclables, New Zealanders could make changes in their own lives, Sage said.
This included using reusable shopping bags, keep cups and water bottles, and supporting businesses that were committed to reducing their plastic pollution.
Associate Minister for the Environment, Eugenie Sage, says she shares Maddie Barr's concerns about plastic pollution in the environment.
Maddie's letter came at a time when the production and sale of microbead products had been banned, supermarkets phased out plastic bags and companies such as Foodstuffs and Countdown planned to take plastic-stemmed cotton buds and plastic straws off shelves.
Although Greenpeace New Zealand said these were great first steps, they were only the tip of the iceberg.
"It's time for the New Zealand Government to step up as a leader on the plastic crisis," Greenpeace's plastics campaigner, Emily Hunt, said.
Maddie Barr's handwritten letter to Stuff, in which she is concerned about plastic pollution, even came in its own envelope.
She said people like Maddie were the strongest champions in the fight against plastic.
"Maddie's letter shows the power that kids and youth play in this movement."
According to 2017 figures, 541 million plastic straws are thrown away every year.