It's up to all of us to end the littering scourge
The two main forms of this menace are the dumping of rubbish from passing cars and fly-tipping – the random dumping of household waste.
The local GAA club undertook on a major litter pick of the roads of our rural parish in recent weeks. It was organised as a pre-season team-building exercise but what a shame they should have to do such a job. It is heartening to see local community groups engage in litter picks at this time of year, before the new growth of grass and shrubbery takes over, but what a waste of community time; cleaning up after others.
As we travel Ox Mountain roads and drive past beauty spots, we can often overlook a menace that lies in the undergrowth or behind stone walls. The two main forms of this menace are the dumping of rubbish from passing cars and fly-tipping – the random dumping of household waste.
At this stage, most of us have grown up in a system, civic and educational, where we have all heard the message encouraging us not to litter. Today, schools actually teach the importance of avoiding littering and pollution. The simple message is: BRING IT HOME. In this way our children, the adults of tomorrow, are encouraged to do the right thing when it comes to waste disposal.
A well-established Green Schools Programme now operates nationally, promoting long-term, whole-school action in support of a greener environment. Green Schools is a student-led programme with involvement from the wider community. The initiative highlights litter as their number one target area. They drive their message home in simple yet graphic terms.
Litter and Waste is the first theme of the Green Schools programme. The theme is a great starting point for encouraging a sense of personal pride and responsibility in tackling two visible issues in schools and communities.
During the 2019-2020 year, Green Schools students on the Litter and Waste theme diverted 9,500 tonnes of waste from landfill. That’s the same weight as 80 blue whales, or 4,500 giraffes!
I heard an astounding statistic recently in relation to plastic pollution: the weight of plastic in our oceans will very soon equal the weight of fish in our oceans! I don’t know how much fish are in the sea, but that sounds like an awful lot of plastic.
Litter.ie is a website run by the Department of the Environment, Climate and Communications. The site is, in effect, a national litter pollution monitoring system. It explains itself in the following term and provides some very interesting statistics.
This national service goes on to explain the main content and causes of Ireland’s litter problem. It is a right wake-up call. The following is an extract from their most recent data.
Where, you might ask, does all the waste come from? The main factors causing litter pollution identified in litter pollution surveys, in order of significance, were as follows: passing pedestrians – 41.1%; passing motorists – 20.6%; retail outlets – 8.4%; gathering points – 7.3%; places of leisure/entertainment – 4.9%; fast food outlet – 4.3% and fly-tipping/ dumping – 2.5%.
Incidentally, major entertainment event only contributes 0.1%. This is likely due to the high level of regulation in this area and the fact that permission for such events is highly conditional on a proper clean-up.
While it is not always perfect, we have never had a better system of waste disposal than we have today. We have Bring Centres where, for a small enough fee, we can get rid of 99% of all domestic waste; from old paint cans to electrical goods to fertiliser bags. There are the regular bin collections that take waste from our very doorstep.
I am always puzzled to find out at what point the message breaks down. Is it an awareness problem? Is it the expense? Is it indifference? Awareness is now widespread; we know pollution is bad for our landscapes, our rivers, our mountain. The expense of disposing of refuse and heavy-duty or corrosive household items may be a consideration for some but it is neither excessive or prohibitive.
Which brings me to indifference. I think this is the real issue.
“I just need to tidy up around the house or the yard and sure I have no time to go the Bring Centre and my small trailer load won’t be noticed in yon forestry or behind yon wall."
The ironic thing about this type of indifferent dumping is that it takes a lot of planning. I have never seen anyone launching an old washing machine over a stone wall near a public amenity in broad daylight – mind you I did see, in recent days, a soiled nappy being hurled from a passing car. No, this kind of dumping is done at night, usually by travelling some distance from home. I would venture to say it takes more time and effort and expense to get rid of rubbish in this way than simply leaving it out for the bin lorry or taking it to a Bring Centre.
So where is the problem and how can we solve it? There is no doubt that our young people are well and truly educated in the ways of and reasons for proper waste disposal. At this stage, most adults also know the rights and wrongs. A lack of reinforcement of the key messages and a lack of enforcement of the by-laws has led to indifference. If we think that our little bit rubbish won’t make any difference, just look at the figures above. It all adds up.
We cannot wait for the great industrial powers to lead the way on easing pollution but we can start a movement from the ground up. Let’s start with ourselves as individuals, then reinforce the message with our children, our wider family and our community. It isn’t China or India or Russia that are littering our roads – it is ourselves. If we get our act together, we can sort it out easily and quickly. In doing so, we will save our GAA clubs and our Tidy Town committees a lot of shoe leather each spring.
