Published: March 2024
There are calls for a total ban on filters in cigarettes after recent research found more than half of all smokers don’t bother putting them in a bin.
With filters taking the unenviable title of the most littered item in Australia, No More Butts executive director Shannon Mead said they were a burden on the country. “If only 10 per cent of Australians smoke and up to 65 per cent litter, Australia is then paying for the costs as well as being impacted by the actions of a relatively small minority,” Mr Mead said.
A 2021 report commissioned by the World Wide Fund for Nature Australia estimated 8.9 billion cigarette filters were carelessly discarded across Australia every year; each one starts leaching chemicals into their surroundings within an hour, while the estimated 300 kilograms of microfibres released is comparable to the emissions from domestic laundry.
With cigarette butts constituting a third of all litter and taking 15 years to start breaking down, Sea Shepherd Australia marine debris campaign co-ordinator Karolina Strittmatter said it took a lot to clean them up.
“Since 2016 we have removed 269,659 used cigarette filters in WA. In 2023 alone, 19,798 butts were taken away, during 37 community clean-ups, with the most found at Bathers Beach.”
While NSW is considering expanding its single-use plastics ban to include cigarette filters, there haven’t been any moves to follow suit in Western Australia.
No More Butts is also calling for the International Plastics Treaty to deal with the issue of cigarette filters, while others have pointed to a European Union model that makes manufacturers and smokers bear the financial burden of filter pollution through a levy on each cigarette that gets sold.
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