This year Chamber of Commerce Miami Beach set an ambitious goal to eliminate any single-use plastic disposables and tableware from its operations. We partnered with a local forward-thinking company, Lean Orb, that is building plastic alternatives to single-use tableware and catering supplies. The company is currently working with clients such as Four Seasons, The W Hotel, Cambridge Innovation Center and other restaurant groups who are taking the environmental initiative to phase out plastic disposables.
Although Lean Orb specializes in disposable packaging, their team’s ethics, goals, and decisions center around a zero-waste model. With that being said, they want to rebuild our community economically and sustainably by replacing toxic waste with products made purely out of agricultural waste such as plant roots, grass fibers, and highly sustainable wood.
Every human on the planet is currently responsible for the production of 88 pounds of plastic. The amount of plastic we use daily keeps growing and is expected to increase by 40% in the next decade. The only way to interfere is by changing our habits around the products `we consume and by using our purchasing power to influence companies and policymakers.
As a community, we understand that single-use toxic materials should be obsolete. In order for us to progress we have to re-imagine our business as usual and regretfully say that we had found many ways where plastic packaging should not be used. All that is to say, now we finally have solutions available locally. Lean Orb’s product line includes disposable food containers, cups, straws, plates, and cutlery.
Jerry Libbin, the chair of Miami Beach Chamber had recently announced a strong stand in the support of Plastic-Free Miami Beach that was formed to address the issue of plastic waste. Worldwide consumption of single-use plastic disposables is estimated at 140,000 each second. With global plastic leak rate into the environment being 32% or about 25million tons/ year we have a big responsibility to take action and transition to both re-usable and compostable solutions.
“Miami is a waterfront community, the waste we fail to keep onshore becomes a global problem. It is no longer a local problem within a single municipality”, says the founder of Lean Orb, Anastasia Mikhalochkina.
Miami Beach has recently joined the most progressive cities in the effort to become plastic-free by banning certain single-use plastic products. This didn’t happen overnight and we look forward to seeing more progress to come.
Lean Orb’s team of local experts on eco-packaging are available to help businesses transition. For more information visit www.leanorb.com or call 305.988.0877.
