Over 5.2 trillion cigarettes will be smoked this year, according to Philip Morris International chief executive André Calantzopoulos, who spoke in January to The Wall Street Journal.
That translates to big money. The firm earned $48.2 billion in 2006.
What a drag!
The unintended consequence of more smokers is cigarette litter. From highways to residential streets, from sidewalks to boardwalks, and from parks to beaches, the butts are everywhere.
Whether due to lack of infrastructure or money, city leaders and business owners either don’t know, don’t care, or can’t afford to enforce (or don’t know in the case of police or the health agent) what occurs when a person leaves a bar, shop, or government building, smokes a cigarette, and snuffs it on the ground with his shoe.
Maybe there is no ash receptacle around. Maybe there is only a trash can and the smoker doesn’t want the ash to light up and burn any paper in the can. Maybe the smoker, or the business owner, is uneducated about the dangers of cigarette litter.
With support from Philip Morris USA (with revenues of $18.4 billion), the Prevent Cigarette Litter program identifies several facts on smoking that you should know:
- 22 states and the District of Columbia have passed or approved indoor smoking bans, as of 2007
- 95% of cigarette filters are manufactured with a non-biodegradable plastic called cellulose acetate
- Of 1,000 smokers in a survey this year, 35% toss five or more cigarette butts per pack on the ground
- 80% of smokers said they would properly dispose of their butts if suitable bins were available
- 18% of cigarette litter is washed into storm water drains, enter and pollute the watershed, and may be eaten by land and marine animals
I see it everyday. I am guessing you do, too.
So. What do we do about it?
For starters, I turn to the British and their creative juices.
With the marketing slogan of “Bin Your Butts,” a partnership of 15 tourist attractions along the British Riviera devised a clever way to keep cigarette butts off the beaches.
Last summer, elementary school children began combing the beach with used 35mm film cartridges and gave the “portable ashtrays” to smokers, asking them to snuff the cigarette litter in the bins rather than in the sand.
“It’s a popular initiative in parts of Australia,” explained James Hull, the campaign’s mastermind. “I have managed to obtain 10,000 old film cartridges from a hotel photographer for the trial run, although it would be amazing to see this becoming a long-term scheme supported by local businesses.”
“Keeping a clean bay is vital to our tourism industry,” the press release continued. “Similar initiatives in the past have been proven to reduce butts on beaches by 26%, which would be a significant achievement over the coming summer months.”
Annual cleanup efforts, like the ones in and around northeast Massachusetts, are great for the environment and instill volunteerism, but they are annual.
City Manager Dave Ruller of Kent, Ohio recently wrote about renovating an old Kent State University sidewalk sweeper into a cigarette litter picker-upper. His website has a picture of the contraption. That’s an idea other communities can adapt.
Closer to home, the Gloucester Daily Times printed a letter to the editor last month from the League of Women Voters of Cape Ann which seeks volunteers to help with brainstorming ideas, ranging from mandating ashtrays outside restaurants and bars to businesses imprinting their logos on portable ashtrays.
Signage needs to be increased, along with proactive education. In downtown Newburyport, for instance, there is an imprinted sign amid brick stones, “Dump No Waste | Goes to Ocean.” But the sign was old and rusted.
I don’t know the best solution, but I do know sandy beaches are supposed to be full of glitter, not litter. Streets and parks, too.
What do you think? Do you live in an area that has a useful way of combating cigarette trash?
[Photo credits: Jim Grady (top) and danzden (bottom)]
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Ari Herzog is an online media strategist and Newburyport City Councilor-Elect.
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Ari,
I can remember being at some beach – I think now it Good Harbor Beach in Gloucester – and sitting there digging up cigarette butts out of the sand. I put them in some random container we had brought with us and threw them in the trash on the way to the car. I smoke, as you know, but I always try to be responsible with the butts.
On the other hand, there is so much litter, I wish there were people who cleaned the streets – what could we call them….?
Everyone is responsible for their litter, whether it be a cigarette butt, an empty coffee container or a candy wrapper.
Things do seem to be getting better on the big stuff. I hate seeing cigarette butts lying around on the ground as much as the next person, who does not smoke!
Downtown Omaha’s major buildings do not allow smoking ANYWHERE on the premises. For example, headquarters building where I work, you can’t even smoke on the sidewalk. Smokers here have to walk two blocks to a designated downtown smoking area and there special butt containers for their waste.
Douglas county does not allow smoking in any public indoor area and most bars have the same recepticals outside.
I quit smoking almost a year ago and will admit that I threw most of mine on the ground. Back then I always thought they were just cotton and would bio degrade fairly quickly. I learned the environmental effects after I had already quit.
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