Cigarette Butts

• Approximately 4.5 trillion cigarette butts are littered worldwide every year.¹
• It can take up to 12 years for a cigarette butt to break down.²
• Almost 50% of all litter in urban areas is tobacco related products including butts, cellophane wrapping, foil inserts and packaging.4
• Approximately 7.2 billion cigarettes are discarded in Australia each year. If placed end to end they would extend 144,000 kilometres and circle the planet 3.6 times.5
• In most Western countries cigarette butt litter accounts for around 50% of all litter.²
• Over 4,500 fires a year are caused by cigarettes and smokers' materials.³

Plastic Bags

• Each year Australians use 3.92 billion new plastic shopping bags. If 3.92 billion plastic bags were tied together, they would circle the globe 24 times. ²
• Plastic bags can take between 15 and 1000 years to break down in the environment.³
• In the marine environment plastic bag litter is lethal, killing at least 100,000 birds, whales, seals and turtles every year. After an animal is killed by plastic bags its body decomposes and the plastic is released back into the environment where it can kill again.¹
• Over 200,000 plastic check-out bags are dumped in landfills every hour.¹
• An average of 500,000 shopping bags are collected every year on Clean Up Australia day.²
• It is estimated that there are approximately 46,000 plastic bags floating per square mile of ocean.²
• An estimated 6.67 billion plastic bags are disposed of in landfill sites throughout Australia each year.³
• It is estimated world wide that 1 trillion bags are used and discarded every year.²
• Coles Bay in Tasmania successfully banned plastic check-out bags in all their retail stores. In the first twelve months, Coles Bay stopped the use of 350,000 plastic check-out bags.¹