These tiny little fruit stickers are not tiny little problems

I spend a ridiculous amount of time peeling these plastic stickers off fruit and vegetables before they go anywhere near my compost. And even then, while preparing my veggie beds for winter garlic this weekend, I found a pile of old ones in the soil - stubborn relics of supermarket convenience.

That's the point. They look inconsequential. But they are anything but. A South Australian Government review described plastic produce stickers as a "widespread and persistent contaminant" in compost systems. Even people like me who try hard to remove them still find them in finished compost. The SA Government's review found home composters averaged 25 minutes a week dealing with them. These things are designed for a moment of retail convenience, but they take ages to pick off. And those that aren't picked off, remain in soils and compost for decades.

And the scale is staggering. An official South Australian estimate says 5.62 billion plastic produce stickers enter the Australian produce supply chain every year. At an average of just 0.02 grams each, that's more than 112 tonnes of stickers annually. Tiny bits of plastic, multiplied billions of times, become a national pollution stream. It's the equivalent of 100 Toyota Yaris of plastics and contamination going into our environment and food systems every year.

This is symbolic of a much bigger problem: the creeping, insidious nature of plastic pollution and the way responsibility is shifted away from the companies that create it. These stickers suit supermarkets, packers and automated checkout systems. But the cost is pushed onto composters, councils, gardeners, soil and - eventually - our health.

The evidence is strongest on two things. First, these stickers break down into microplastics, which combined with the forever chemicals in their inks, poison our soils, food systems and health. Second, alternatives already exist. Compostable labels made from cellulose, wood pulp and starch-based materials are technically viable. Laser marking can remove the sticker altogether in some cases. What's missing isn't innovation. It's political will.

So here is what should happen. Governments should legislate a rapid transition away from plastic produce stickers and require certified compostable, non-toxic alternatives wherever labels are still needed. And in the meantime, all of us need to do our best to keep these stickers out of compost and FOGO - because once they get in, they're remarkably good at hanging around.

They may be small. But they add up. And like so much plastic pollution, they've crept into our lives so gradually that many people barely notice them. I do. Because I keep picking them off fruit and vege and I keep finding them in my soil.

I'm sure many of my readers do too.

Plastic produce stickers are a real contamination problem.