Large volunteer sand and sea cleanup planned for Friday

A massive beach and sea cleanup day will take place on Friday to draw policymakers’ attention to the need to better protect marine life.

Thousands of volunteers are expected to help collect trash, from Rosh Hanikra in the country’s far north to Ashkelon on the southern Mediterranean coast. Cleanups will also take place on the Eilat beaches in southern Israel and in and around the Sea of Galilee.

Some 100 information stations will be set up along the various routes.

The cleanup will start at 8 a.m. and continue into the afternoon, in line with Health Ministry coronavirus regulations.

Taking part are the Society for the Protection of Nature in Israel, the Israel Nature and Parks Authority, the Environmental Protection Ministry, Life and Environment, Green Course, Zalul, EcoOcean, the scouts movement, the US Embassy in Israel, European Union representatives, divers groups and local authorities.

An SPNI spokesman said the campaign sought to influence decision-makers to establish more marine reserves, ban single-use plastic at beaches and increase enforcement and against litterbugs.

Further information about the event can be found here in Hebrew.

Some eight million tons of plastic are thrown into the sea worldwide each year.

Nearly three-quarters of the trash found in Israeli waters in the Mediterranean and the Red Sea consists of bits of plastic bags and plastic containers, according to the National Marine Waste Monitoring Report for 2019, published on October 14.