The ocean is one of the world's most precious resources. Over 3 billion people depend on it for their livelihoods (that's more than 1/3 of the world's population!) Many people, such as fishermen, depend on the ocean for a living, and many animals call it home. Coral reefs, for example, are inhabited by many exotic sea creatures. However, they are slowly dying, which would result in many animals losing their homes. The ocean also provides food for living things all over the world, and is an ideal place for vacation. The ocean may be a wonderful place, but it will not be in the future. It is polluted by many things, such as cans, food utensils, glass, and paper, just to name a few. One of the main things that pollute the ocean is plastic. We use plastic everyday, but if we don't throw it away responsibly it will end up in the ocean, causing harm to the animals and environment. One of these items we use daily is plastic straws. Plastic can take up to centuries to decompose in the ocean, so it won't be hard for something as small as a straw to get stuck in parts of an animal. Many people know about the time a straw got stuck in sea turtle's nose. Just one straw endangered the life of an animal. It is likely that more events like this will happen in the future. To minimize the amount of harm we do to the ocean, a step is to remove plastic straws from McDonalds. Many people buy from there everyday, so removing the straws and placing them with biodegradable straws means less plastic pollution in the ocean. Unlike plastic straws-taking centuries to decompose, biodegradable straws only take up to a few months/weeks to decompose. Biodegradable straws are also natural, so it's safe for the environment as well. Approximately 500 million straws are used each day causing a dramatic increase to plastic waste each day! Biodegradable straws taste and feel exactly like regular straws but the only difference is that they can decompose/degrade into the ground and are made of plants, for ex: plant starches such as corn, potato's plant oil and plant fibers. reducing plastic waste. Our main goal is to get McDonalds to begin using biodegradable/decomposable eco friendly straws. We believe this will dramatically reduce plastic waste all around the world.   

By Ashley Lu, Claire Tseng and Madison Arroyo.