By The Great British Beach Clean begins this week
Every September, thousands of volunteers go to the UK’s beaches for a week to clean up litter as part of a citizen science event: The Great British Beach Clean.
The litter data that is collected helps the Marine Conservation Society’s conservation work as well as the International Coastal Clean-up (ICC).
The Clean begins today, Friday 17 September, and ends in a week on Sunday 26 September.
Participants are tasked with recording all of the items that they collect within a 100m radius.
Removing litter from the beaches has an immensely positive impact on the UK’s oceans as well.
The data collected has resulted in the plastic bag charge, the banning of microplastics in personal care products, more effective wet wipe labelling and the support of a tax on single-use plastic items.
Since the 5p charge was introduced for plastic bags, they have appeared 55% less on UK beaches, the MCS reported.
On top of that, approximately 425 litter items (including 30 drinks containers) are reportedly found per 100m of beach surveyed.
Since the pandemic, however, around 30% of the beach cleans that took place last year resulted in face masks and PPE (Personal Protective Equipment) being found.
Great British Beach Clean Coordinator Lizzie told the MCS: “Considering mask wearing was only made mandatory in shops in England in late July, little more than three months before the Great British Beach Clean, the sharp increase in PPE litter should be a word of warning for what could be a new form of litter polluting our beaches in the future.”
Last year’s Beach Clean organised participants into ‘bubbles’ to follow Covid-19 regulations, but this year should result in the community connecting more.
To sign up, you just need to download their survey form and get to work.
You can view all of the MCS’s events here.
You can also email them at beachwatch@mcsuk.org or call them on 01989 567807.
They are available to contact from 9:00am till 5:00pm on Mondays to Fridays.
