2023-05-09 03:20:38
The “Stop2drop” organization is launching this Tuesday, and until May 23, the largest national cigarette butt collection action in Switzerland. The goal is to collect one million cigarette butts within two weeks.
The independent NGO wants to send a strong signal for a clean and healthy environment. This is the second action at the Swiss level after 2021. Nearly 5,000 people then got involved and made it possible to collect some 960,000 cigarette butts.
The approach is intended to be participatory and open to everyone: young people, adults, families, smokers and non-smokers. “This challenge can be taken up perfectly by school classes, youth centers and sports clubs,” the organizers said in a press release.
Students found an association
In 2019, a tenth grade class from Burgdorf (BE) wanted to give a strong signal against cigarette butt littering. The students thus founded the stop2drop association and launched a collection action.
Today, the association has become an independent NGO which organizes collective actions to draw attention to the serious consequences of cigarette butt littering on the environment.
The national action is taking place for the second time, in collaboration with a wide network of partners. Stop2drop is part of the Free.Fair.Future Children and Youth Programme. and is financially supported by the Tobacco Prevention Fund.
Huge overall cost
Cigarette butt littering is a real problem worldwide, notes the organization. The filters are made of plastic and are not biodegradable. Over time, they degrade into tiny plastic particles, which pollute our environment for years to come.
Cigarette butts contain more than 7,000 toxic substances, such as nicotine and heavy metals. These are released and contaminate the ecosystem when the butts are exposed to rain and snow.
In Switzerland, municipalities spend nearly 200 million francs a year to combat littering in the broad sense, according to the Federal Office for the Environment (FOEN), a quarter of which is solely related to cigarettes.
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