My new friend Tata (his actual name) picked me up this morning and took me to a secluded beach outside of Coron Town, Palawan, the Philippines. This trip opened my eyes to a problem.

Tata drives a motorized tricycle — a vehicle that represents an unholy marriage of a motorbike, a third tire, and a covered steel cage that offers very little protection for the driver or passenger(s), aside from the welcome shield against the powerful SE Asian sun. This particular trip cost me $13.57 plus the $0.85 admission fee to what is possibly this island’s nicest beach.

It’s true, there are nicer beaches nearby that are accessible by private outrigger. And that might cost me $30-$35, to arrange a charter. Also, I took a full-day tour a few days ago with a crew of four and 22 other tourists, and we visited some quite picturesque places with some of the clearest water I have ever seen.

But today, I just wanted to go for a swim and catch a little sun. Not too much, mind you, because I have a sneaking suspicion that the local sunscreen I purchased on Monday might not have the SPF-30 protection or waterproof staying power it claims to have on the tube.

The route to this beach starts out rough and gets rougher. Tata caught a few bone-rattling potholes on the way up a good-sized hill. I sat in the back of the tricycle, on a seat designed for dainty Filipino asses, not massive red, white, and blue ones — a literal description of my ass once the ride was over. The seat selection was Tata’s strong suggestion, not because it was safer than the front seat (which is to say, not really much of a safety upgrade), but because it positions the 250-pound tourist over the rear tire of the motorcycle, which greatly improves traction. This was shown to be a wise decision after we left the roughly paved road and took on the partially washed-out dirt road to the beach.

I took some video footage, shown here, while we were on the paved road. My phone went back in the sling bag, and I hung on with both hands when we hit the dirt. We were only on the dirt road for 10-12 minutes, but it felt like double that. And the trike, with its loud 4cc powertrain, sounded like a squealing prized hog holding a megaphone.

Once we arrived and paid the 85-cent fee, Tata parked his rig and his slight frame under a shade tree, and I ventured onto the beach.

The wind was onshore but light. I was the third person to lay out my blanket, and then I went right into the water because even at 10 AM, the sun was relentless, and the air temperature was scalding. That’s when I realized the info about the Philippines I had read a month or so ago was true.

The Philippines has a plastic problem. The trash was flowing in.

It might surprise people to learn that this archipelago nation reportedly produces 2.7 million tons of plastic waste annually, one-fifth of which ends up in the ocean. The Philippines literally creates a third of the global ocean-based trash — more than any other country in the world.

The US, on the other hand, produces far more plastic waste than the Philippines — 42 million tons — fifteen and a half times the amount created by the Philippines. But its contribution to ocean trash is small.

What is the reason so much plastic enters the ocean from the Philippines and other places like India and Malaysia, and not the developed world? Partly, it’s because these countries can’t afford to implement modern waste processing and instead, allow rivers to become the vehicle that carries their trash away. It’s also due to a reliance on saché-size product packaging for things like shampoo, laundry detergent, and coffee (I learned this the hard way when trying to find a two-pound bag of ground coffee in a half dozen local supermarkets. I found only hundreds of packets of single-serving instant coffee in nearly every store.)

The problem is real.

So what did I do when I encountered a very nice beach where trash was floating in on the incoming wind and tide? I picked up as much as I could, being the good Nantucket Clean Team founding member that I am. But the Philippines needs a lot more than my efforts and those of a thoughtful female tourist I saw also picking up trash. (Thank you, Miss.)

This is a global problem that impacts marine life in every corner of our oceans. It requires a global solution. Imagine if the First World could step in and provide modern waste management to the Third World? That would do it. We could save the ocean — a global resource that feeds the 8 billion people who live on earth. Unlike a lot of problems in this world, this one is fixable. We just need to start thinking globally and open our pocketbooks.

Then we can turn our attention to fixing the problem of Tata’s too-stiff trike suspension.