The month of April is An Taisce’s National Spring Clean month and people across Tipperary are encouraged to get involved.
The annual initiative urges people to tackle litter and help fight climate change.
In Tipperary last year, 4,000 volunteers took part running more than 250 clean ups all over the county.
So far, in the Premier County, 110 communities have already registered to take part.
This year’s theme is community pride and people are encouraged to get together with friends, family, colleagues, classmates and neighbours to clean up their areas.
National Spring Clean is run by the Environmental Education Unit of An Taisce in partnership with Local Authorities and supported by the Department of Environment, Communications and Climate Environment and Mars Wrigley Ireland.
For the past 23 years National Spring Clean has volunteered over 12 million hours of their time to remove 42,000 tonnes of litter across the country.
Minister for the Environment, Climate and Communications, Eamon Ryan TD, said:
“The statistics for what the National Spring Clean achieves every year are staggering and are a real testament to the energy, drive and community commitment of volunteers up and down the country who come out and work hard together to protect, enhance and clear up our local environments.
“It’s unpaid, largely unsung and often unseen work that improves the quality of life for all of us. I would like to salute your work and express my gratitude for the hours of selfless volunteer work that help make National Spring Clean such a critical part of the annual environmental calendar here.
“I would also like to acknowledge the key role played by An Taisce in overseeing the campaign. My Department will continue to provide support to the campaign and I look forward to the many events that will be held countrywide.”
National Spring Clean Manager, Emlyn Cullen, commented:
“The Spring Clean has always been a community initiative as much as anti-litter campaign. Communities big and small come together to do their bit for their local area. It can be a couple of neighbours doing their road or a whole town with multiple organizations joining together to do a massive clean-up. These collective efforts bring people together and create tremendous social capital.”
Organisers say that while the National Spring Clean usually runs through the month of April, please remember that personal actions throughout the year are very important too.
Here are some choices people can make daily to make a positive change:
– When you are out for a walk, visiting a park or a beach, do a quick #2minutestreetclean or a #2minutebeachclean
– Avoid single-use plastic when possible, by choosing more sustainable alternatives, such as reusable bottles and coffee cups, cotton bags, metal straws.
– Don’t litter and if a bin is overflowing, keep your waste until you find a way to dispose of it properly
– If you can’t reduce or reuse, recycle; know where and how to recycle all types of waste.
– Recent statistics show that, in Ireland, discarded cigarette butts make up for 60% of litter on the streets. Always bin your butt.
– Make sure to bin your chewing gum when you’re done to avoid a €150 gum littering fine and keep our streets clean.
To make sure that each community clean up can run as smoothly as possible the National Spring Clean has also provided various downloadable information packs on their website for their volunteers to read.
The clean-up information pack contains details on how to organise an event, health and safety information, litter facts, useful contacts, media and publicity advice, a guide on how to recycle and information on litter and the law.
For those who would like to organise a clean-up please log on to the website at www.nationalspringclean.org to request a free clean-up kit.
