After a break in 2020, over 70 volunteer groups have signed up for Clean Coasts’ Big Beach Clean 2021 and are ready to tackle marine litter in county Cork. The event will be launched on Friday 17^th of September and will run until the 19^th of September, the same weekend as International Coastal Cleanup.  

Clean Coasts, supported by Cully and Sully, will provide volunteers with clean up kits.

The Big Beach Clean is an annual call-to-action organized by Clean Coasts that calls volunteers from communities all over Ireland getting involved to remove litter from our beautiful coast at the end of the bathing season, as part of the International Coastal Clean-up (ICC), operated internationally by Ocean Conservancy.

The initiative is also an opportunity for the over 1,000 registered volunteers to get involved in a worldwide citizen science project, which will entail collecting the amount and types of litter on Irish beaches and filling in Clean Coasts’ Marine Litter Data Cards that will help heighten awareness about the issue of marine litter serving as an indicator of the magnitude of the problem.  

This year will see the involvement of the National Spring Clean programme once again with registrations having been open nationwide to all residents of Ireland, no matter how far from the coast they are based. Statistics have shown that over 70% of plastic pollution affecting our ocean comes from land-based actions. For this reason, Clean Coasts have asked volunteers to help prevent litter from entering our waterways and seas by holding a clean-up no matter where they are in the country and tackling the problem at the source.

Founder Cullen Allen (Cully) said:

Cully & Sully are proud to be partners with the Big Beach Clean again for 2021. The work carried out by the teams across the Island of Ireland is amazing and unfortunately very much needed during these times. We all use our local beaches and have spent time on many of the beautiful beaches and waterways across Ireland and are so thankful for the work that the groups and organisations do.

Cully and Sully will also be hosting a Big Beach Clean event in Schull, West Cork on Friday, the 17th of September from 12:30pm-2:00pm. The event will take place just on the Schull foreshore and participants will be meeting in the car park across from the Schull Harbour Hotel. Tickets are free to register for on Eventbrite.

Clean Coasts would like to thank our over 6,500 volunteers who signed up for this call to action nationwide for their commitment and effort.

A map of clean-ups organised by volunteers is available on our website. For more information visit www.cleancoasts/org.

Notes:

If you can’t join us this September for our Big Beach Clean, please remember personal action is very important. Everyday choices matter to the future of our ocean. Here’s our Clean Coasts top tips for helping out the ocean that we all can do:

• When visiting the beach or park, do a quick #2minutebeachcleanor #2minutestreetclean: spend two minutes before you leave the beach picking up a bit of rubbish to leave.
• Choose to refuse single-use plastic. Check out our social media for tips and inspiration.
• If you can’t reduce or reuse, recycle; know where and how to recycle all types of waste.
• Never litter! Always dispose of your waste properly and if a bin is overflowing, hold onto your rubbish until you can dispose of it properly
• Even cigarette butts contain plastic (cellulose acetate in their filter) that never biodegrades. Bin them!
• Avoid cosmetics that contain micro-plastic beads. For more information see here
• Remember to ‘Think Before You Flush’, sanitary waste is very harmful to marine life, put a bin in your bathroom and only flush the 3 P’s, (Paper, Pee, Poo)

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