The Christmas season is upon us again and massive amounts of waste is being generated in the form of packaging, unnecessary items and gift wrapping. In fact, during holiday season, we generate 25 percent more waste than usual. For several years now, I have stressed to my relatives and friends that we do not need any material gifts in this house since all of our drawers and closets are already packed to the limit with stuff. Instead, on my wish list is quality time and services. I would love a new hair cut, quality dinner time with my man, or maybe a spa day. My children would certainly appreciate activities like concerts, a theatre play or a movie together with loved ones. In these hectic times, I feel that time is the most valuable thing you can give someone and frankly, giving gifts to adults seems unnecessary - they probably already have what they need.  

If, for some reason, you are unable to give time, here are some tips that can help reduce the holiday waste load. 

1) Make your own gifts. Bake sweets, sew an oven mitt or if your time is limited, by consumable goods like wine or chocolate.
2) Wrap your gifts in old magazines, boxes and cloth. 
3) Shop in flee markets - everything does not have to be new! 
4) Remember responsible shopping; sometimes it is necessary to buy something material but be aware of your choices! Choose natural materials, durability before price and choose certified products. Buy locally grown and seasonal products which support the local economy, need less packaging and have smaller ecological footprints.
5) When it comes to food; use leftovers for pizza, lasagna or tortilla stuffing and calculate how much food you really need before buying.   

Here are some voucher ideas if you want to go with the immaterial gift:
 
1. A gift cards to a spa, massage, hair dresser, restaurant or adventure park.
2. Gift card to Itunes.  
3. Movie tickets.
4. A voucher to Netflix or HBO.
5. Offer to be a nanny for a day, extremely appreciated among parents to young children. 
6. A voucher to a cleaning service. 

In a recent study by the University of Lund, researchers found that nanosized plastic particles in the water can be transported to fish brain tissue via the food chain and cause behavioural dysfunction. Now this does not sound too funny - what if the particles are further transported to humans eating the fish? With all the plastics found in water, this could be a serious concern. With this said, so far all the nanoplastic experiments have been conducted in laboratory condition and to my best knowledge, no nanoplastics have actually been detected in any natural aquatic systems. This is a new emerging study area and detection methods are still in an early stage of development. 

In Thailand, we found microplastic particles only sparsely on the heavily used recreational beaches of Phuket. Off course, it is possible that the particles were broken down to such a small size that we were unable to detect them, but on a microscale, it seemed that the plastics did not stay in the shallow 1-10 meter the beach zone where most of the biota is found. This off course is an interesting finding since we detected large amounts of bigger plastics lying on all the beaches  - surely the particles must end up somewhere - just not on the local shallow sea floors.    

In many countries, including Finland, fish and invertebrate tissues are screened regularly for microplastics. So far, nothing alarming has been found. In the North Pacific gyre, in the huge floating garbage patch, microplastics was found in 35% of the sampled fish. However, most marine animals are good at extracting unwanted items. Let´s hope that new nanoplastic detection methods will not reveal any significant changes in these numbers. After all, approximately one billion people are dependent on fish as the principal source of animal protein. In addition, domestic, local fish is an ecologically sustainable, healthy and tasty food item!         

Juuri julkaistussa tutkimuksessa Lundin yliopistosta tutkijat löysivät nanoluokan muovihiukkasia kalojen aivoista, jonka seurauksena havaittiin käyttäytymishäiriöitä. Muovihiukkaset olivat kulkeutuneet kalojen aivoihin levien ja pienten äyriäisten kautta  ja läpäisseet aivo-veriesteen. Tulos oli pelottava ja herätti monta kysymystä - voiko nanomuovi kenties myös kertyä ihmisten aivoihin seafoodin välityksellä? Tämä voi olla vakava uhka ottaen huomioon kuinka paljon muovia vesistöistämme tällä hetkellä löytyy. En kuitenkaan heti lopettaisi kalan syömistä. Kaikki tutkimukset jossa nanomuovia on tavattu eliöissä on tehty laboratorio-olosuhteissa ja tietääkseni yhdestäkään luonnollisesta ekosysteemistä nanomuovia ei ole vielä löydetty. Tutkimusala on uusi ja menetelmät vasta kehitysasteella.

Thaimaasta löysimme suhteellisen pienen määrän mikromuovia kovassa käytössä olleilta Phuketin turistirannoilta. Toki on mahdollista että muovipartikkelit hiekan seassa olivat hajonneet niin pieniksi partikkeleiksi että emme löytäneet niitä, mutta ainakaan mikroluokan muoveja ei näyttänyt kertyvän suurina määrinä 1-10 metrin hiekan sekaan. Tulos oli sinänsä mielenkiintoinen, sillä suurempia muoviroskia oli kaikilla rannoilla pilvin pimein. Jonnekin muovin on päädyttävä, tulosten valossa ei kuitenkaan paikallisille matalille rannoille.   

​Monessa maassa, Suomi mukaanlukien, kalojen ja selkärangattomien kudoksia on alettu tutkia mikromuovin varalta. Vielä mitään hälyttävää ei ole löydetty. Pahimmassa Pohjoisatlantin roskalautassa muoveja löydettiin noin 35 prosentista tutkituista kaloista. Tosin useimmat mereiset eliöt ovat hyviä poistamaan kehostaan ei-toivottuja esineitä ilman suurempia ongelmia. Toivottavasti uusien nanomuovimenetelmien kehittyessä nämä luvut eivät pahene. Arviolta noin miljardi ihmistä on riippuvainen meren antimista ensisijaisena proteiinin lähteenä. Lisäksi kotimainen kala on ekologisesti kestävä, terveellinen ja herkullinen ruoka.