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Paper Short Abstract:

This paper explores the intersection between agricultural and industrial processes that are represented as circular and cyclical, bringing a political ecology lens to two environmental problems – intensive agriculture and plastics – that are often kept separate but are in fact deeply interconnected.

Paper Abstract:

In Trinidad, Flores, which lies some 200km in-land from Uruguay’s capital of Montevideo, a sparse ‘eco-parque’ consisting of a few industrial units sitting alongside the landfill of this provincial capital, has long been celebrated as an example of circular economy and responsible waste management. Integral to this reputation is a small plant for recycling rural plastics, which is run by a cooperative that provides supplies, seeds, and services to Uruguay’s arable and livestock farmers. The cooperative supplies agro-chemical products (herbicides, pesticides, fertilisers) to farmers, then recovers the empty High Density Polyethylene (HDPE) containers, shredding, washing, and pelletizing these to be sold on to another plastics producer in Montevideo. As such, the cooperative was lauded for “closing the circle” of agricultural consumption and disposal. However, the use of such plastic encased petro-chemicals is also embedded in and shapes the increasingly intensive and short growing cycles of Uruguayan agriculture, which has turned to cash-crops like sorghum and soya, causing documented damage to the soil and health impacts on rural residents. This paper explores the intersection between these agricultural and industrial processes that are represented as circular and cyclical, bringing a political ecology lens to two environmental problems – intensive agriculture and plastics – that are often kept separate but are in fact deeply interconnected. Rather than simply dismissing both of these as bad, however, it uses ethnography with local plastics and agricultural workers to track the shifting local moral economy around economic growth, crop growth, and waste management.