Earth Day: Ending Accra's plastic pollution

Homes, streets, gutters and even beaches — bags and bottles have become a common sight on the coast of Ghana. Single-use plastic is mostly used for packaging of food and water. But it doesn't easily decay. As a result, fishing hauls often catch more plastic than fish in their nets.

The bottles used to be thought of as waste. Now some use them as building blocks. Toa House, a social enterpise, builds houses with discarded plastic PET bottles filled with sand. The project is one way of tackling the country's housing deficit.

So-called 'sanitation ambassadors' educate their peers and parents on keeping the environment free from plastic. Their task is not easy. Sanitation issues, caused in part by plastic-clogged gutters often lead to diarrheal diseases and are a breeding ground for. A World Bank study estimates that sanitation related diseases cost the country about 1.6% of its GDP.

Some solutions are small-scale. This group of children are been taught to make "hanging gardens" from discarded plastic bottles to plant flowers in.

Rufai Zakari, an environmental artist, makes art from plastic waste he collects from street corners. He hopes to start exporting his work abroad while creating jobs for the youth in his community.

NGOs have called on Ghana's government to make bio-degradable plastics — or follow Kenya and Rwanda in banning single-use plastic bags. The demands come in the run-up to Earth Day, an international awareness day for the environment, which falls on April 22. This year's theme is eradicating plastic pollution.