Earlier this year a team from the Department of Geography at The University of Manchester published a paper on microplastic contamination in the rivers around their city. This work generated extensive media interest because it shone a light on a global contamination problem in freshwaters that had gone undetected for decades. This talk will set out the major issues surrounding microplastics in our rivers and will argue that the key to addressing the microplastic problem in the world’s oceans is fundamentally linked to what we do in our river basins.

Speakers: Rachel Hurley, Jamie Woodward and James Rothwell Department of Geography, The University of Manchester