Nearly two years have passed since the June 2021 launch of the Green Sea Setouchi Hiroshima Platform (GSHIP), a public-private group working to reduce plastic waste discharged from within Hiroshima Prefecture into the ocean to zero.
The organization includes Hiroshima Prefecture-based material manufacturers, food companies and retailers, as well as the prefectural government, with each of the involved groups tackling the project head on.
At the trading arm of Kinki Nippon Tourist in Hiroshima, about 10,000 toothbrushes for hotels in the prefecture were packed in boxes for shipment. The toothbrushes' hard, transparent handles look at first glance like ordinary plastic. But on their packages, alongside the GSHIP logo, each has a label that reads: "Uses cellulose acetate resin, which is made from wood and returns to nature."