Can’t stop littering? Rubbish
There are thousands of rubbish items on Taranaki roads – and Trevor Woudt is picking them up, one piece at a time.
Arriving back in the region after four years in Auckland, Woudt noticed large amounts of litter on Taranaki roads and wanted to put a stop to the problem he felt was marring the region’s image.
‘‘The mountain is just incredible, then you have all this greenery and then you’ve got all this stuff on the sides of the roads,’’ he said.
He started the group Litter Action Taranaki, which heads out on the weekend and picks up litter from road sides around Taranaki.
So far the group has focused on Junction Rd, Plantation Rd and the Surf Highway where they had found 1.2 pieces of litter per metre of road.
More than 70 per cent of the litter found by the group have identifiable brands, with 30 per cent being takeaway drinks, 28 per cent food containers, 22 per cent household items and 9 per cent snack food wrappers.
An overwhelming 33 per cent of the items picked up by the group are from one brand, although Woudt would not identify the brand while he was still collecting data.
At a recent New Plymouth District Council meeting, Woudt claimed a technology that could track litter items from the first point of purchase by using barcodes was being used in places around the world, but was unlikely to be used in Taranaki any time soon, as it was too complicated.
Tracking the litter could allow for quicker and more accurate fines to be put in place for people who discard it on the road, something he thinks should be done more often.
‘‘You can actually link a purchase with a tracking item. We’re not talking anything expensive, we’re not talking a radio frequency; we may be talking a barcode.
‘‘The technology exists where you could actually have a purchase event and link in items and then if those items are found in the environment, it’s an instant fine,’’ he said.
The New Plymouth District Council can fine people for littering and the fines range between $100 to $400.
‘‘Over the last five years, we had two fines for littering in 2013, three fines in 2014, one in 2015, five in 2016 and no fines last year,’’ NPDC Chief Operating Officer Kelvin Wright said.
‘‘NPDC is aiming to go Zero Waste by 2040 and we’ve allocated about $21 million over the next decade to help us work towards this.
‘‘We have a number of new litter bins set to roll out in locations across the district and we will also be reviewing how we tackle fly tipping and littering as part of new initiatives in our Waste Management and Minimisation Plan.’’
‘‘The technology exists where you could actually have a purchase event and link in items and then if those items are found in the environment, it’s an instant fine.’’
Trevor Woudt