Annual cigarette butt clean-up
Brussels
For the last four years, three municipalities of the Brussels area (Saint-Gilles, Brussels city and Etterbeek) have partnered with citizen movement #LeoNotHappy – named in honour of American actor Leonardo Di Caprio – to clean up the cigarette butts that litter the streets of Brussels.
The movement was launched in April 2016 by a 26-year old student who wanted to harness the power of social media to drive positive change. In 2017, volunteers collected 120,000 butts in just three hours; in 2018, they collected 270,000; and in 2019, 500 volunteers collected 500,000 butts and distributed free ashtrays to smokers. The 2020 event was cancelled due to the Covid-19 pandemic, and the next edition should take place in spring 2021.
The movement has become an NGO with over 32,000 followers on Facebook. It plans to partner with more public authorities to raise public awareness around the pollution generated by cigarette butts, each of which can pollute up to 500 litres of water.
