The announcement came directly from Costa Rica's Minister of Environment and Energy, Edgar Gutiérrez: "Within four years we want to be the first country in the world to have a national strategy to eliminate single-use plastics".

The Central American country's decision is part of its plan to become a "carbon neutral" nation by 2021: in addition to eliminating single-use plastics, Costa Rica has already achieved extraordinary milestones when it comes to renewables. For months, indeed, all the electricity generated came from non-fossil sources.

Read also: 98% of electricity in Costa Rica comes from renewable sources

Costa Rica says goodbye to single-use plastics

Costa Rica today has an enormous problem with waste. It is estimated that at least one fifth of the 4 tonnes of waste produced every day is not even collected, and ends up in the environment, polluting rivers, beaches and seas.

"Being a country free of single-use plastics is our mantra and our mission. It will not be easy, and the government cannot do it alone," writes Minister Gutiérrez. "To drive these changes, we need all sectors – public and private – to commit to actions to replace single-use plastic through five strategic actions: municipal incentives, institutional policies and guidelines for suppliers; substitution of single-use plastic products; research and development and investment in strategic initiatives."

Plastic waste, a global problem

Discarded plastic has become a problem of global proportions. According to a study carried out by the World Economic Forum and the Ellen MacArthur Foundation, 32 per cent of the nearly 80 million tonnes of plastic produced every year ends up in the oceans. The equivalent of dumping a lorry load of rubbish into the sea every minute. According to one estimate, 99 per cent of seabirds will have ingested remnants of plastic objects by 2050.

The Ismar Cnr also warns, in a study published in Scientific Reports, that the presence of microplastics in the western Mediterranean has one of the highest concentrations in the world. "Microplastics consist of those plastic fragments smaller than 2 millimetres which, although not visible to the naked eye, have been found floating almost everywhere in the Mediterranean, with concentrations among the highest in the world. For example, in the North Pacific subtropical gyre in 1999, approximately 335,000 plastic fragments per km2 were estimated, whereas in the Mediterranean the average is around 1.25 million."

Read also: Microplastics: the Mediterranean is the most invaded sea by waste

Microplastics would also end up in household taps, as reported by a recent study carried out by Orb Media in collaboration with the Guardian.

According to the research, which tested 159 drinking water samples collected across various cities around the world, 83 per cent of samples were found to be contaminated with microplastics. This would mean that it could also be found in foods prepared with such water: bread, pasta and soups that we eat every day would be laced with tiny plastic granules.