Today marks the official launch An Taisce’s National Spring Clean 2022 which is operated by the Environmental Education Unit of An Taisce in partnership with Local Authorities and supported by the Department of Environment, Communications and Climate Environment and Mars Wrigley Ireland.
The initiative has taken place in the month of April for the past 23 years during which volunteers have given over 12 million hours of their time to remove 42,000 tonnes of litter across the country.
Community spirit is integral to the work that The National Spring Clean does and each year communities from all over the country come together to ensure their local areas are as clean possible for everyone to enjoy together.
This year the theme of community pride is at the forefront of the campaign with The National Spring Clean urging people of all ages to gather friends, family, classmates, neighbours or colleagues to unite in cleaning their shared green spaces together.
National Spring Clean 2021 was the biggest and the longest campaign so far, taking place between March and August, and despite the current situation and restrictions at the start of the year.
In county Louth, over 2,500 volunteers carried out over 150 clean-ups throughout the county in 2021. In 2022, over 70 groups and communities already registered to carry out a clean-up as part of the National Spring Clean, with some groups who have already been carrying out some clean-ups while waiting for the official launch of the campaign today.
Among them, Peninsula Marine Litter Project, Drogheda Tidy Towns and Dundalk Tidy Towns are just a few of the groups who have been organising small clean-ups while waiting for the month of April.
In county Meath, over 1,500 volunteers carried out over 70 clean-ups throughout the county in 2021. In 2022, over 60 groups and communities already registered to carry out a clean-up as part of the National Spring Clean.
This year the campaign is on track to make 2022’s National Spring Clean campaign the biggest yet with the organization already surpassing the number of registrations they had gained this time last year.
It is also an opportunity for volunteers to take local actions to make a change at a global scale as combined local actions can have a global effect on how we dispose and treat our waste. This has a substantial impact on the levels of emissions of several greenhouse gases which contribute to climate change.
To make sure that each community clean up can run as smoothly as possible the National Spring Clean has also provided various downloadable information packs on their website for their volunteers to read.
The clean-up information pack containing details on how to organise an event, health and safety information, litter facts, useful contacts, media and publicity advice, a guide on how to recycle and information on litter and the law.
For those who would like to organise a clean-up please log on to our website at www.nationalspringclean.org to request a free clean-up kit.
SOCIAL MEDIA
- Facebook: @NationalSpringClean
- Twitter: @NationalSpringC
- Instagram: @nationalspringclean
- YouTube: National Spring Clean
