RedMarLitter Project
The project “Innovative Techniques and Methods for Reducing the Marine Litter in the Black Sea Coastal Areas” was launched within the Joint Operational Programme “Black Sea Basin Programme 2014-2020”.
It aims to significantly reduce pollution of the Black Sea Basin by tracking and analysing the main waste streams and carrying out pilot activities to clean pre-defined areas of marine litter. It has three main goals: analysing the load of specific representative areas with waste, tracking the main polluting flows and carrying out waste cleaning through innovative measures in a specific demonstration pilot site.
A study was conducted in targeted areas which identified the different types of litter found on beaches from 2017 to 2019, highlighting that the vast majority of all is constituted of artificial polymer material (between 60 and 65%). Under the project monitoring in 2019/2020, 91% of litter found on beaches was artificial polymer material.
The collected data was stored in a common database containing information about water flows and floating waste in the project countries. In the report, a set of guidelines for sustainable marine litter management were released which include:
- Using waste retention mechanisms to regulate dumping of waste on beaches
- Participation in cleaning campaigns
- A reduction in the use of disposable plastics
