A one day Marine Litter Training supported by the Sustainable Waste Actions in the Pacific Project ( SWAP Project) Marine Litter Pilot Project was conducted yesterday at the Buadoko Venue at Kakabona Community, Solomon Islands.
Marine Litter Audit was the focus of the training which aims to build local capacity to take on role of future litter monitoring and surveys in the country as well as to attend online Trainer workshops that will be delivered later under the pilot project.
A total of 30 participants were involved in the one-day training which include community representatives, regional participants, Honiara City Council, the Ministry of Health & Medical Services and from the Ministry of Environment, Climate Change, Disaster Management & Meteorology.
Group photo of training participants during the Marine Litter Training that was facilitated by Sustainable Coastlines and funded under the Sustainable Waste Actions in the Pacific ( SWAP Project).
Participants had the opportunity to get hands on practice different components of the Marine Litter Training. This includes, learning about the health and safety of beach clean-ups and surveys, preparing the site for the litter survey, collection of the litter, sorting and data collection of the sorted wastes into different categories.
From a 10m x 6m area that was audited during the training, 500 liters of litter weighing a total of 87.5 kgs were removed and it comprised a total of 4,480 items of litter (larger than 5mm) for a measured litter density of 74667 items of litter per 1000m².
Sorting of the collected litter into different categories of waste
Plastics makes up the highest composition out of the different waste categories assessed with a total count 2639 and total weight of 38,124 grams.
This is one of the highest litter densities that was ever measured using the litter intelligence methodology.
Fishing Village Community and Gizo Community are two other communities that will benefit from the Marine Litter Training this week.
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– ECD Press
