A 2009 study by Anthony L. Andrady and Mike A. Neal titled "Applications and Societal Benefits of Plastics" examines the history and uses of plastics:
Humans have benefited from the use of polymers since approximately 1600 BC when the ancient Mesoamericans first processed natural rubber into balls, figurines and bands. In the intervening years, man has relied increasingly on plastics and rubber, first experimenting with natural polymers, horn, waxes, natural rubber and resins, until the nineteenth century, when the development of modern thermoplastics began.
In 1839, Goodyear invented vulcanized rubber, and Eduard Simon, a German apothecary, discovered polystyrene (PS). Developmental work continued through the nineteenth century on natural/synthetic polymers producing such notables as celluloid for billiard balls, polyvinyl chloride (PVC), which is used in myriad applications, and viscose (rayon) for clothing. Development of modern plastics really expanded in the first 50 years of the twentieth century, with at least 15 new classes of polymers being synthesized. The success of plastics as a material has been substantial; they have proved versatile for use in a range of types and forms, including natural polymers, modified natural polymers, thermosetting plastics, thermoplastics and, more recently, biodegradable plastics. Plastics have a range of unique properties: they can be used at a very wide range of temperatures, are chemical- and light-resistant and they are very strong and tough, but can be easily worked as a hot melt. It is this range of properties together with their low cost that has driven the annual worldwide demand for plastics to reach 245 million tonnes today….
Even at a somewhat conservative annual growth rate of 5 per cent, a continuation of this trend suggests that at least 308 million tonnes of plastics will be consumed annually worldwide by 2010. The consumption patterns of the five most widely used types of plastics in their different application sectors appear to be consistent in the developed regions of the world. Well over a third of consumption is in packaging applications (with common products such as containers and plastic bags) and another third or more in building products including common products such as plastic pipes or vinyl cladding. In developing countries, usage patterns may differ slightly; for instance, in India, 42 per cent of resin consumption was reported to be in the packaging sector. Automotive applications and toy/furniture manufacture use smaller but significant volumes of plastics. Use of plastics in the developing world is increasing as the lower unit cost and improvements in performance specifications continually promote its substitution for materials such as paper, metals, wood and glass.
Plastics clearly constitute an important component of the range of materials used in modern society. Almost all aspects of daily life involve plastics or rubber in some form or the other. These include clothing and footwear, together with products for use in food and public health applications. Over 40 million tonnes of plastics were converted into textile fibre (mainly nylon, polyester and acrylics) worldwide for use in apparel manufacture. Polycotton clothing contains high levels of PET plastic; high-performance clothing is almost exclusively plastics—polyesters, fluoropolymers and nylons. Fleece clothing is 100 per cent plastic (PET) and can be made from recycled PET. Most footwear also relies heavily on plastics; the footbed and outsoles are made from polyurethane or other elastomeric material while the uppers might be made of vinyl or other synthetic polymer. Plastics also deliver many public health benefits. They facilitate clean drinking water supplies and enable medical devices ranging through surgical equipment, drips, aseptic medical packaging and blister packs for pills. They provide packaging that reduces food wastage, for instance in the use of modified atmosphere packaging that prolongs the life of meat and vegetables….
As suggested by the futurist Hammond in his recent publication ‘The World in 2030’, the speed of technological development is accelerating exponentially and, for this reason, by the year 2030, it will seem as if a whole century's worth of progress has taken place in the first three decades of the twenty-first century. In many ways, life in 2030 will be unrecognizable compared with life today. During this time, plastics will play a significantly increased role in our lives. Plastics are already becoming ‘smart’ and will likely serve numerous important roles in future living, including human tissue or even organ transplants, key materials used in ultra-low-emission lightweight cars and aircraft, superior insulation for homes that run on photovoltaic technology based on plastic collectors, reusable electronic graphic media for books or magazines, smart packaging that monitors food content continuously for signs of spoilage and high-efficiency solid-state lighting based on plastic organic diode technology. As petroleum reserves become more limited, new varieties of plastics are likely to increasingly be made from renewable biomass. These will contribute to the already extensive array of mechanical and aesthetic performance properties that plastics are well known for. Any future scenario where plastics do not play an increasingly important role in human life therefore seems unrealistic. Source
A portrait of British scientist Alexander Parkes (1813-1890). Parkes developed the first synthetic plastic in 1855; it bears his name: Parkesine. Source
Following Parkes work, the next big step in the development of modern plastics was the work of this guy, Belgian-born Leo Baekeland. He too created a plastic that still holds his name, Bakelite, which was the first plastic that kept a constant shape after being molded, as well as being the first plastic that was completely synthetic in its nature. Source
These early plastics quickly acquired practical everyday uses., including the Bakelite radio above. Other early uses included whistles, cameras, telephones, and buttons. Source
In this case, plastic served as a replacement for ivory. These celluloid dice and chip were much cheaper to manufacture than the ivory they would have been made from in the past. Source
In her book Plastic: A Toxic Love Story, Susan Freinkel discusses some of effects of our interaction with plastic over time.
Plastics freed us from the confines of the natural world, from the material constraints and limited supplies that had long bounded human activity. That new elasticity unfixed social boundaries as well. The arrival of these malleable and versatile materials gave producers the ability to create a treasure trove of new products while expanding opportunities for people of modest means to become consumers. Plastics held out the promise of a new material and cultural democracy. The comb, that most ancient of personal accessories, enabled anyone to keep that promise close….
Families gathered around Bakelite radios (to listen to programs sponsored by the Bakelite Corporation), drove Bakelite-accessorized cars, kept in touch with Bakelite phones, washed clothes in machines with Bakelite blades, pressed out wrinkles with Bakelite-encased irons—and, of course, styled their hair with Bakelite combs. "From the time that a man brushes his teeth in the morning with a Bakelite-handled brush until the moment when he removes his last cigarette from a Bakelite holder, extinguishes it in a Bakelite ashtray and falls back upon a Bakelite bed, all that he touches, sees, uses will be made of this material of a thousand purposes," Time magazine enthused in 1924 in an issue that sported Baekeland on the cover….
The flow of new products and applications was so constant it was soon the norm. Tupperware had surely always existed, alongside Formica counters, Naugahyde chairs, red acrylic taillights, Saran wrap, vinyl siding, squeeze bottles, push buttons, Barbie dolls, Lycra bras, Wiffle balls, sneakers, sippy cups, and countless more things. Source
Today, plastic is all around us, though much of it goes to waste. The above plastic containers, however, are being recycled.
Indeed, though hugely economically viable and extraordinarily convenient, many groups are fighting to reduce the amount of plastics we use do to their sometimes unsafe and hugely wasteful nature. The California-based Ecology Center is one such group. Their website briefly summarizes the several of the key problems associated with plastics as follows:
Americans are generating more plastic trash than ever, and very little of it gets recycled. Plastics and their byproducts are littering our cities, oceans, and waterways, and contributing to health problems in humans and animals….
Some plastics we know are toxic, such as #3, which is also known as PVC or vinyl. PVC contains phthalates and heavy metals, and creates dioxins when it burns. Other plastics contain Bisphenol-A (BPA), which has been identified as a chemical that disrupts hormones. Plastics can contain thousands of possible additives, and manufacturers are not required to disclose what their recipes are. Any plastic can leach, depending on the conditions (light, heat) and what additives it includes. The Ecology Center recommends avoiding plastics when possible, particularly in toys and products for children, and products that come in contact with food or drink. Source
Reflecting on the progress of the Green Revolution shortly after it happened in 1968, William S. Gaud coins the term:
Over the last five months we have seen new evidence of their progress. Record yields, harvests of unprecedented size and crops now in the ground demonstrate that throughout much the developing world - and particularly in Asia - we are on the verge of an agricultural revolution.
In May 1967 Pakistan harvested 600,000 acres to new high-yielding wheat seed. This spring (1968) the farmers of Pakistan will harvest the new wheats from an estimated 3.5 million acres. They will bring in a total wheat crop of 7-1/2 to 8 million tons - a new record. Pakistan has an excellent change of achieving self-sufficiency in food grains in another year.
In 1967 the new high-yielding wheats were harvested from 700,000 acres in India. This year they will be planted to 6 million acres. Another 10 million acres will be planted to high-yield varieties of rice, sorghum, and millet. India will harvest more than 95 million tons in food grains this year - again a record crop. She hopes to achieve self-sufficient in food grains in another three or four years. She has the capability to do so.
Turkey has demonstrated that she can raise yields by two and three times with the new wheats. Last year's Turkish wheat crop set a new record. In 1968 Turkey will plant the new seed to one-third of its coastal wheat growing area. Total production this year may be nearly one-third higher than in 1965.
The Philippines have harvested a record rice crop with only 14% of their rice fields planted to new high-yielding seeds. This year more land will be planted to the new varieties. The Philippines are clearly about to achieve self-sufficiency in rice.
These and other developments in the field of agriculture contain the makings of a new revolution. It is not a violet Red Revolution like that of the Soviets, nor is it a White Revolution like that of the Shah of Iran. I call it the Green Revolution.This new revolution can be as significant and as beneficial to mankind as the industrial revolution of a century and a half ago. To accelerate it, to spread it, and to make it permanent, we need to understand how it statrted and what forces are driving it forward. Good luck - good monsoons - helped bring in the recent record harvests. But hard work, good management, and sound agricultural policies in the developing countries and foreign aid were also very much involved. Source
The following excerpt from an article in The Economist also summarizes many of the important positive effects of the Green Revolution:
The first green revolution helped save the developing world from disaster. Two plant breeders, Norman Borlaug with wheat and M.S. Swaminathan with rice, persuaded governments in Asia and elsewhere to encourage the planting of higher-yielding varieties, especially of rice; 3.5 billion people, half of mankind, get a fifth of their calories or more from the stuff. When the men started work in the early 1960s, China was suffering the famine of the Great Leap Forward. And India was widely thought to be on the brink of starvation.
Today in Asia, famines are things of the past. One reason is the spread of democracy. Another is the green revolution, which has ensured that there is plenty of rice—India even exports it. And demand seems to be shrinking: the richest Asian countries, Japan, Taiwan and South Korea, are eating less rice. This has led governments which once supported the green revolution to think that a new one would be unnecessary. Rice, they reason, is a problem that has been solved. Better to improve the diets that are causing obesity or change the intensive-farming practices that are damaging the environment.
But it is not clear that the mission has been accomplished. In Asia as a whole, consumption per person is flat, not falling. The population is still growing, so demand for rice is rising on the continent where 90% of the crop is raised. In Africa, where a third of the population depends on rice, demand is rising by almost 20% a year. At that rate rice will surpass maize as Africa’s main source of calories within 20 years. Source
Norman Borlaug, who's research led to the beginning of the green revolution. Source
Bourlag's obituary in the Seattle Times summarizes his work in the following way:
Norman Borlaug, the father of the "Green Revolution" who is widely credited with saving more than a billion lives by breeding wheat, rice and other crops that brought agricultural self-sufficiency to developing countries, died Saturday in Texas. He was 95. Source
For his influential work, Bourlag was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1970. In a lecture at the Nobel Institute, Bourlag discussed the Green Revolution.
Civilization as it is known today could not have evolved, nor can it survive, without an adequate food supply. Yet food is something that is taken for granted by most world leaders despite the fact that more than half of the population of the world is hungry. Man seems to insist on ignoring the lessons available from history….
The term "The Green Revolution" has been used by the popular press to describe the spectacular increase in cereal-grain production during the past three years. Perhaps the term "green revolution", as commonly used, is premature, too optimistic, or too broad in scope. Too often it seems to convey the impression of a general revolution in yields per hectare and in total production of all crops throughout vast areas comprising many countries. Sometimes it also implies that all farmers are uniformly benefited by the breakthrough in production.
These implications both oversimplify and distort the facts. The only crops which have been appreciably affected up to the present time are wheat, rice, and maize. Yields of other important cereals, such as sorghums, millets, and barley, have been only slightly affected; nor has there been any appreciable increase in yield or production of the pulse or legume crops, which are essential in the diets of cereal-consuming populations. Moreover, it must be emphasized that thus far the great increase in production has been in irrigated areas. Nor have all cereal farmers in the irrigated areas adopted and benefited from the use of the new seed and the new technology. Nevertheless, the number of farmers, small as well as large, who are adopting the new seeds and new technology is increasing very rapidly, and the increase in numbers during the past three years has been phenomenal. Cereal production in the rain-fed areas still remains relatively unaffected by the impact of the green revolution, but significant change and progress are now becoming evident in several countries.
Despite these qualifications, however, tremendous progress has been made in increasing cereal production in India, Pakistan, and the Philippines during the past three years. Other countries that are beginning to show significant increases in production include Afghanistan, Ceylon, Indonesia, Iran, Kenya, Malaya, Morocco, Thailand, Tunisia, and Turkey….
The green revolution has won a temporary success in man's war against hunger and deprivation; it has given man a breathing space. If fully implemented, the revolution can provide sufficient food for sustenance during the next three decades. But the frightening power of human reproduction must also be curbed; otherwise the success of the green revolution will be ephemeral only. Source
A graph illustrating the enormous increase in production and yield of of cereal grains world wide since 1961. Source
A large part of the green revolution was the increased use of pesticides in agriculture. Source
Although largely successful in decreasing famine and other problems in developing countries, the Green Revolution brought problems of its own. The following is a summary of some of the criticisms of the Green Revolution from a document put out by the International Food Policy Research Institute:
A revolution of this magnitude was bound to create some problems of its own. Critics charged that the Green Revolution resulted in environmental degradation and increased income inequality, inequitable asset distribution, and worsened absolute poverty. Some of these criticisms are valid and have been or still need to be addressed. But there is a tendency today to overstate the problems and to ignore the appropriate counterfactual situation: what would have been the magnitude of hunger and poverty without the yield increases of the Green Revolution and with the same population growth?
The Green Revolution in Asia stimulated a large body of empirical literature on how agricultural technological change affects poor farmers. Critics of the Green Revolution argued that owners of large farms were the main adopters of the new technologies because of their better access to irrigation water, fertilizers, seeds, and credit. Small farmers were either unaffected or harmed because the Green Revolution resulted in lower product prices, higher input prices, and efforts by landlords to increase rents or force tenants off the land. Critics also argued that the Green Revolution encouraged unnecessary mechanization,
thereby pushing down rural wages and employment.Although a number of village and household studies conducted soon after the release of Green Revolution technologies lent some support to early critics, more recent evidence shows mixed outcomes. Small farmers did lag behind large farmers in adopting Green Revolution technologies, yet many of them
eventually did so. Many of these small-farm adopters benefited from increased production, greater employment opportunities, and higher wages in the agricultural and nonfarm sectors. Moreover, most smallholders were able to keep their land and
experienced significant increases in total production. In some cases, small farmers and landless laborers actually ended up gaining proportionally more income than larger farmers, resulting in a net improvement in the distribution of village income. Source
Many of these problems are becoming more and more apparent in India. This video by food policy analyst Devinder Sharma discusses a number of these growing concerns with Green Revolution in India:
Echoing that sentiment is the following excerpt from an NPR story headlined: "'Green Revolution' Trapping India's Farmers in Debt:
On a recent morning, a drilling rig is pounding away in the middle of a wheat field near the village of Chotia Khurd. The sound, part jackhammer and part pile driver, is becoming increasingly common in the farm fields of northern India's Punjab region.
The farmer, Sandeep Singh, is supervising and looking unhappy as the rig hammers away, driving deeper and deeper under his field in search of water.
When India's government launched the Green Revolution more than 40 years ago, it pressured farmers to grow only high-yield wheat, rice and cotton instead of their traditional mix of crops.
The new miracle seeds could produce far bigger yields than farmers had ever seen, but they came with a catch: The thirsty crops needed much more water than natural rainfall could provide, so farmers had to dig wells and irrigate with groundwater.
The system worked well for years, but government studies show that farmers have pumped so much groundwater to irrigate their crops that the water table is dropping dramatically, as much as 3 feet every year.
So farmers like Sandeep keep hiring the drilling company to come back to their fields, to bore the wells ever deeper — on this day, to more than 200 feet.
The groundwater problem has touched off an economic chain reaction. As the farmers dig deeper to find groundwater, they have to install ever more powerful and more expensive pumps to send it gushing up to their fields.
Sandeep says his new pump costs more than $4,000. He and most other farmers have to borrow that kind of cash, but they are already so deep in debt that conventional banks often turn them away.
So Sandeep and his neighbors have turned to "unofficial" lenders — local businessmen who charge at least double the banks' interest rate. The district agriculture director, Palwinder Singh, says farmers can end up paying a whopping 24 percent.Another side effect of the groundwater crisis is evident at the edge of the fields — thin straggly rows of wheat and a whitish powder scattered across the soil.
The white substance is salt residue. Drilling deep wells to find fresh water often taps brackish underground pools, and the salty water poisons the crops."The salt causes root injuries," Palwinder says. "The root cannot take the nutrients from the soil." Source
