Bangladesh, with a population of nearly 170 million, boasts of a vast maritime boundary along the Bay of Bengal. Much like other oceans, the Bay of Bengal is also plagued by unprecedented levels of plastic pollution.

The standard narrative of the Southeast Asia plastic crisis has a puzzling blind spot. The typical story goes that consumers and governments shoulder all the blame—consumers for using and then tossing out too much plastic, and governments for not instituting adequate waste management systems. But that narrative obviously doesn’t tell the whole story.