Northlanders clean up their beaches and estuaries
Northland Regional Council ran a beach clean-up initiative for NZAEE (New Zealand Association for Environmental Education) Seaweek 2017. This year was bigger than ever with 55 groups registering their beach clean-up and an estimated 3000 people taking part. Groups included CoastCare groups, sports clubs, marae and schools (Photo: Whananaki clean up group). Beach clean-ups took place all around the region, including Baylys Beach, Mitimiti, Taipā, Whangarei Harbour and Ruakaka. Groups who registered were provide with a ‘Beach Clean-up Kit’ which included rubbish bags, gloves, sunscreen, beach clean collection information, beach id guides, and more. Northland’s three district councils all provided free rubbish disposal for participating groups.
As well as taking the time to clean up their beach, 16 groups made the extra effort to audit their rubbish. These groups collected 4670 litres of rubbish from an estimated area of 1430m2. A very high proportion of the rubbish collected was plastic, with this group making up almost three quarters of the waste audited by some of the groups. NRC’s coastal monitoring team have analysed this data and will be using it to work on waste reduction initiatives.
Posted: 6 June 2017 in the News category