Publicity Officer Effie spoke to Fazilette (Faz) Khan about the charity GreenSeas Trust and its aims.
Fazilette (Faz) Khan (MNM) is the founder of the charity GreenSeas Trust, who aim to educate, promote and implement environmental programmes to eliminate plastics entering the seas and coastal areas. Their goal is to ensure marine life and fish stocks are sustainable for future generations. Faz is formally trained as a marine electronic engineer and recently received the Merchant Navy Medal for services to the marine environment, a prestigious award that reflects her writing for many prominent maritime publications, experience as a chartered environmentalist, and over 20 years of marine service.
Faz’s experience at sea opened her eyes to the issue of ocean plastic pollution. She spoke to me of the ‘lightbulb’ moment when she was on a tanker and saw, floating in the water, a tractor tyre with three little paint pots in it’s wake. There wasn’t another ship for another 120 miles, which meant ‘the sea doesn’t have a black hole into which all the rubbish disappears’. Then, ‘of course, as the plastics problem increased, so did the amount of waste you saw. Sometimes you would be on a ship, ploughing through these islands of little…plastics and wood and all sorts’. It wasn’t until a holiday to Tobago, where Faz saw the locals throwing all their rubbish in the ocean that Faz began to think she – an individual – could make a change. As far as timings went, Faz got made redundant the very day after she had a conversation with her father about tackling this waste, giving her the chance to go back to Tobago after setting up GreenSeas in 2003. In Tobago, she set up some oil drum bins with a group of volunteers she got together. This was the first of many successes in Faz’s charitable history. Before long the government saw the good the bins were having and took over, installing their own and continuing the education programme Faz and her group of volunteers had started.
GreenSeas Trust is a pioneering charity. They manufacture BinForGreenSeas, of which there are nine across the whole of the UK. These eye-catching bins carry the message of the consequences of plastic pollution. Faz believes ‘guilt is the answer to everything‘, ‘now we need to say, listen, this is how it’s going to affect your life, are you happy to live with it? Are you happy to be flooded tomorrow because of climate change?’. Part of this solution is education. People need to be taught the impact of their waste and shown how it’s affecting both them and the world around them.
If you’re reading this and you’re wondering how to get involved with GreenSeas Trust, don’t worry because I asked! The charity is always looking for more volunteers, and are in fact looking for a new social media officer at present. Getting involved is a great way to make a positive change in the world. Faz also told me the charity is looking to start branching out into Universities, and are hoping to recruit some University ambassadors soon. The website also has some useful tips on how to reduce personal plastic consumption and waste.
Speaking with Faz it was clear to see her passion for reducing ocean plastic. Hearing the history behind the making of the charity was inspiring and with dedicated individuals like Faz making changes across the world, there is hope for the ocean!
Read more on the GreenSeas Trust website https://www.greenseas.org