'Plastic is political': upcycled art exposes Australia’s fraught relationship with waste

As millions of tonnes of rubbish are shipped offshore, artists across south-east Asia are sending some of it back

Prawiro is one of the last rice farmers in Yogyakarta, Indonesia. And he's worried about his future. A flotsam of plastic has engulfed the nearby river, making access to clean water near impossible. No water means no rice.

Further north, plastic debris in the Citarum River has wiped out more than 60% of the fish population. Many out-of-work fishers have been forced to take up jobs as "trash pickers", sorting through millions of tonnes of plastic exported annually to Indonesia from countries including Australia, the US and the UK.