A new study on the “most littered” brands of products has been released by Keep Australia Beautiful.
And the most common brand names found in our litter were McDonalds and Coca Cola.
It was found on roads and highways, in carparks, national parks and almost all other public places.
Keep Australia Beautiful Queensland CEO, Rick Burnett, said the report was “helpful” in focussing on where Queensland’s litter problem starts.
“It is very concerning that two of the world’s leading food and beverage brands create the source of most litter in our society,” Burnett said.
“It means they are duty bound to do more to educate and influence their customers.
“KAB desperately needs more corporate support to beat litter and promote recycling. Especially in Queensland – which is the most-littered mainland state in Australia.
“And we have been lobbying McDonalds for many years to do more about our litter problem.
“Now they can see this compelling evidence collected on the ground! Coca Cola has become more engaged in recent years and is partnering KAB in several state and national recycling programs.
“It’s disappointing McDonalds doesn’t see its corporate responsibility in this issue, and redirect some of the company’s massive profits to change behaviour among their customers so their food and drink packaging is disposed of properly.
“If this were an oil spill, the company would have to pay to clean it up.
“Fast food is an ever growing part of modern society. And the packaging producers need to be far more pro-active in stopping this litter stream.
“If you count the number of television ads to promote and sell their food products, it would only take a few seconds on the tale of each ad, to say: “And please, use a bin when you’re finished your meal, and help keep Australia beautiful.
“Litterers need reminding and shaming for their thoughtless, lazy and environmentally damaging behaviour.
“We need more signage and media messages – and pressure on suppliers to pay for them.
“All the companies identified in this branded litter study need to be more environmentally aware – reduce unnecessary packaging, make it compostable, and definitely not use plastic.”
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