Over 230 clean-ups set to take place in Ireland this World Ocean Day
Thousands of volunteers answered Clean Coasts and National Spring Clean joint call-to-action to organise a clean-up to protect our ocean this June
7th June | Last May, Irish environmental charity Clean Coasts joined forces with National Spring Clean, to provide communities around Ireland with free clean-up kits to host a clean-up during the week around World Ocean Day.
World Ocean Day is celebrated annually on June 8th to highlight the important role the ocean has for our life and the planet. In 2022, the focus will once more be on the 30×30 campaign: to create a healthy ocean with abundant wildlife and to stabilize the climate, it is critical that 30% of our planet’s lands, waters, and ocean are protected by 2030.
One of the issues affecting our ocean is marine litter that has become a global problem for both humans and marine life. However, communities around Ireland have demonstrated their desire to be part of the solution by taking part in several beach cleaning and clean-up calls to action.
Statistics show that the number one cause of marine litter is litter dropped in towns and cities. Building on the success of the Spring Clean 22 campaign, which took place in the month of April and saw 500,000 volunteers organising over 5,600 clean-ups, the National Spring Clean programme is joining Clean Coasts this year in supporting these communities around Ireland.
Sinead McCoy, Coastal Communities Manager said: “We were so overwhelmed with the support received from the public. In under 72 hours over 230 clean-ups had already registered on the Clean Coasts website. Now over 4,000 volunteers are set to take action for World Ocean Day by organising or joining a clean-up event around Ireland.”
Volunteers who didn’t manage to secure a clean-up kit can still take action by joining an existing clean-up, a list of which can be found on the Clean Coasts website.
World Ocean Day events are happening in the context of a very few busy months for the organisation, which saw other initiatives to protect and learn more about the ocean being launched recently. These initiatives included the launch of our Enjoy and Protect campaign and several events, such as SUP clean-ups or surf lessons followed by a #2minutebeachclean around all the coast of Ireland. In addition to that, Clean Coasts joined Galway City Council for a clean-up of the Claddagh Basin and lower Eglington Canal, where over 2 tonnes of litter were removed from an area that would normally be hard to clean. Other events include the release of two marine biodiversity directories, the launch of our Love Your Coast Photography Competition, the release of new Enjoy and Protect guides, marram grass planting events and more.
Finally, to celebrate World Ocean Day and following the launch of two Marine Biodiversity directories last month, yesterday Clean Coasts has also issued a fourth Enjoy and Protect guide about wildlife photography, specifically designed not just for amateur photographers wishing to enter the Love Your Coast Photography competition, but also for the general public who wish to capture the beauty of our coastline while doing something to protect it.
In 2021, the initiative changed its name from “World Oceans Day” to “World Ocean Day”. By dropping the “s”, its organisers wanted to highlight the fact that we are all connected by a large ocean. This shared ocean supports all life on the planet, by producing most of the oxygen we breathe and regulating climate. No matter where we live, we all depend on the ocean to survive.
This means that each piece of marine litter removed from a beach, river, lake, park or street in Ireland, will have a positive impact on a global scale.