About 10-14 million tonnes of plastic ends up in oceans around the world every year. This gradually breaks down to produce ever-smaller microplastics, which are often mistaken for food (plankton) and are so taken up into the food webs (and might ultimately end up on our plate inside the fish or other seafood we eat). To help reduce pollution, it is first necessary to know where and how much to find.

Together with colleagues from the University Eastern Anglia, UK, and Universiti Malaysia Terrenganu, Swinburne Sarawak recently formed the Malaysian Microplastics Network, MyMip (www.mmp.umt.edu.my). The network aims to map microplastic contamination levels across Malaysia and is funded under a Global Challenges Research Fund awarded to the University of East Anglia under the Global Research Translation Awards (GRTA) program.

Counting microplastics is extremely challenging. Fortunately, through ongoing collaborative work, a cheap and quick methodology has been developed by Dr. Mayes Andrew (UEA) to map microplastic levels and distribution across a range of habitats and ecosystems. More information about the principles behind the method and the use of our Nile red microscope can be found in the recently created Youtube channel (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCLkxWImT8LOt5iyAEBgPBkg/)

Swinburne BSc students and project members collected the first set of samples from local beaches before and after the MCO period was over. We hope to get an idea of how much plastic is found along our beautiful coastline to help identify potential hotspots and enable concerted policy and management efforts.