LOGAN WALKER
This Saturday the Griffith Centre for Coastal Management will host a community BeachCare clean-up event at Harley Park in Labrador.
The event is part of the BeachCare coastal community engagement program run by Griffith Centre for Coastal Management in partnership with the City of Gold Coast.
Volunteers wanting to take part in Saturday’s event will assemble at Harley Park in Labrador near Charis Seafood at 8am to clear the beach of rubbish, before meeting back in the park for a group morning tea.
Griffith Centre for Coastal Management program manager Maggie Muurmans said all volunteers were welcome to attend the event, and more volunteers would mean more litter would be collected.
“Some locations have more litter than others, but with so many people out volunteering we expect to collect a large amount of litter,” Ms Muurmans said.
“For beach care we have about 1100 volunteers who come out each year, volunteering and collecting litter… our education program reaches over 8000 people as well,” she said.
Griffith Centre for Coastal Management staff member Dan Ware said events like the one on Saturday were important to help keep plastics out of the ocean.
“Plastics have a very long life… various animals can mistake the plastic as a food source and ingest it, which then moves through the food chain and eventually, and increasingly, it ends up in our food systems,” Mr Ware said.
“One of the other problems is that plastics act like a sponge for toxins, so they tend to retain toxins that they come in to contact with, which can cause problems for anything that is exposed to them in the future,” he said.
State Member for Bonney, Sam O’Connor, will be among the volunteers at the event.
Mr O’Connor said the BeachCare event was a great way to bring the community together in a way that helped keep Australia’s coastline clean.
“Beach cleans help connect people to the beautiful natural landscape that makes our city what it is,” he said.
“Every few months we collect around 10 kilograms of rubbish, including about 1000 cigarette butts… it’s only a small section of beach, but it makes a big difference.”
The Griffith Centre for Coastal Management runs beach clean events on a regular basis in locations around the Gold Coast, including Tallebudgera, Surfers Paradise and Broadwater Parklands.
For more information about the program, visit their website.
