The Government has announced the provision of €1 million to local authorities under the Anti-Litter & Anti-Graffiti Awareness Grant Scheme, and a further €0.5 million to assist local authorities in dealing with litter at key tourist locations during the peak summer season under the Tourist Season Anti-Litter Grant Scheme.
The just published 2010 National Litter Pollution Monitoring System report shows that litter levels across the country continue to improve, with over 72% of areas surveyed demonstrating a high level of cleanliness. This is the best result achieved since monitoring began in 2002, when only 48% of areas surveyed achieved this level.
The 2010 report reveals that:
* There has been an increase in litter free areas from 6.8% in 2009 to 9.7% in 2010;
* 62.8% of all areas surveyed were slightly littered, a decrease of 0.7% on 2009 levels;
* Moderately and significantly polluted areas have decreased by 1.5% and 0.6% to 24.2% and 3.1% respectively;
* The percentage of grossly polluted areas remained constant at 0.3%
* Cigarette related litter (51.4%), food related litter (23.5%), packaging litter (11.3%), and sweet related litter (7.4%) were identified as the main constituents of litter nationally;
*Passing pedestrians (37.8%), passing motorists (19.5%), retail outlets (10.2%) and gathering points (7.8%) were identified as the main sources or causes of litter nationally.