Litter survey finds Ballina remains 'cleaner than European norms'

Ballina stays inside the top ten in the IBAL 2023 litter rankings which found that the north Mayo capital was once again deemed 'cleaner than European norms'.

The final litter survey of 2023 by business group Irish Business Against Litter (IBAL) shows Ballina again deemed ‘cleaner than European norms' in 10th spot in the ranking of 40 towns and cities nationwide.

As part of the IBAL Anti-Litter League, An Taisce monitors towns independently and in accordance with international grading standards and for the first time since surveys began 20 years ago, no area was deemed ‘seriously littered’, with Maynooth claiming top spot.

The An Taisce report for Ballina stated: “Another fine performance from Ballina. There was great evidence of Tidy Towns tie in with the community – an excellent example of this were the colourful illustrations of historic interest along the side of the Dunnes Stores Premises.

“With seven top ranking sites, Ballina has scored very well and there were no heavily littered ones. With regard to the individual survey sites, Pearse Street was beautifully laid out, especially just outside the ‘olde’ style Library building. The Riverwalk – Cathedral Road, Humbert Street Car Park and Tom Ruane Town Park were all very much deserving of the top litter grade,” the report read.

While litter levels rose slightly nationwide, over 60 percent of towns surveyed were deemed clean in 2023, with Maynooth edging out Mallow and much improved Sligo to take the title of cleanest town.

Waterford was again our cleanest city, ahead of Galway. These were the only cities to be judged ‘clean’, with Cork City Centre improving to ‘moderately littered’ but Dublin falling to ‘littered’, alongside Limerick.

“There is some good news in our cities, however,” says Conor Horgan. “For years our worst performing areas were deemed either ‘litter blackspots’ or ‘seriously littered’. This baseline would seem to be changing, with ‘littered’ becoming the bottom tier. Cleanliness begets cleanliness, and there is reason to hope the improvement will continue in future years.”

A surprise finding of the IBAL study was the rise in coffee cup litter, which is now close to peak-Covid levels. Coffee cups were found at over 30 percent of the 500 plus sites surveyed.

“We are concerned at potential delays in introducing a coffee cup levy,” added Mr Horgan. “We believe this action is needed to stamp out a product which is out of step with the circular economy. Irrespective of how recyclable or compostable take-away cups are, these statistics show too many of them are ending up on our streets.”

IBAL says Killarney has benefited from having banned single-use cups last year, a move embraced by the community.

Next month's introduction of the Deposit Return Scheme was welcomed by the IBALas a potential 'game-changer' in the fight against litter, much as the plastic bag levy was. The scheme will see consumers pay a deposit of 15 cent on cans and up to 25 cent on plastic bottles, refundable on their return.

“This latest survey shows these items to be present in just under half of the hundreds of sites we surveyed. This scheme will remove a large portion of this litter and bring about a significantly cleaner environment in 2024. While there may be some inconvenience for consumers, the prize is a very real, and a very immediate one.”

There was another significant rise in the prevalence of disposable vapes, highlighted previously as an emerging source of litter. These were found in more than 10 percent of all sites covered.