Sharjah
Discarded cigarette butts are a form of non-biodegradable litter, as stated by the US National Library of Medicine. This means that these butts cannot be broken down and are thus an environmental concern. Despite that, we find people throwing them on the road, on pavements, in parks and many other public places.
So, we decided to make a difference by organising an event to collect cigarette butts, in the Al Majaz area of Sharjah.
It all started when I saw a post on Instagram by one of my students - Prashasti Saxena. She mentioned how she went around with her father, collecting cigarette butts and disposing them safely into the recycling bins. Appreciating her efforts, I approached her and discussed what needs to be done further as disposing them into the bins was not the permanent solution.
At 8am, on one of the warmer mornings in January, 50 enthusiastic student volunteers of almost all age groups from different schools gathered. The motive was to clean up the whole area and spread awareness about the harmful effects of tobacco.
They split into two groups and picked up as many cigarette butts as possible. They covered the park, residential areas, Al Majaz Waterfront and the streets nearby. The event ended at 11am, with a collection of around 11,400 cigarette butts by the volunteers.
During the planning of the event, the worry was about the volunteers getting ready to do this under the sun, but to my surprise there was no lack of enthusiasm for this good cause. Many of the cigarette butts were stuck between the cracks in the pavement or in the bushes, which made the task slightly harder than we thought. But, with team effort, the whole event turned out to be a success.
The problem now was, what should be done with the collected cigarette butts? The main motive of the campaign was to clean the place, but this was not a permanent solution. Cigarette filters are made from wood-based plastic fibers that take generations to fully decompose, as stated by a study published by National Geographic. The same study, however, confirms that a handful of companies in the world are working to collect and recycle butts, by turning them into plastic lumber.
Another study conducted in Finland confirmed that this waste can also be used to generate power, which is used to heat water in the local areas. So, we wrote to many of these organisations and sent them our proposal.
Since this involves incinerating the waste, it needs to be carried out by a waste management organisation. So, since we had not heard back from any of the international organisations, we got in touch with Bee’ah, Sharjah’s environmental management company, and handed over the discarded butts that we had collected. They informed us that they had a special division that dealt with such waste.
This campaign made us realise how big this issue is and that the alarming rate of smokers in today’s world is so high, yet hardly anybody seems to be aware about it. Kill this silent killer before it kills you! This is not only affecting you, but destroying the environment. Our campaign, though small, will benefit many residents in the UAE. We hope to spread awareness through social media about this issue and bring more people on board to help us fight the battle against tobacco use.
— The reader is a teacher based in Sharjah.
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FACTBOX:
According to a Gulf News report published on March 24, 2016 people who throw their cigarette butts on roads and in public places will be slapped with a Dh500 fine. This federal fine will double, then triple for each repeat offence. This also applies to public parks and even busy commercial areas around the UAE.
The Dubai Municipality alone is said to spend over Dh50 million annually on the maintenance of public parks, according to a Gulf News report published in November 2013. The municipality has placed ashtrays and waste bins every 50 to 100 metres in the busy central business district areas of Bur Dubai and Deira.