Beaches without plastic in Cyprus - 1st July 2022

An experiment's taking place in Cyprus to clean up the beaches. Tourists and local businesses aren't using plastic.

Travel company TUI started the clean-up, which involves hotels and restaurants at two popular beaches. TUI employee Veronika Blach knows how serious the problem is.

Veronika Blach: "It's important that we all work together, especially the tourism sector. There's so much to be done. Think of all the businesses, the bars, restaurants, hotels, and how much plastic is consumed there. There's so many reductions but there's still so much plastic, so we can do so much more together."

It's been an interesting experience for Chris Karas, a beach restaurant owner. It was a challenge at first.

Chris Karas: "At the beginning, it was difficult to think that we would not have single-use plastics such as water bottles, etc. But, slowly slowly, with the help of the initiative, and with the will of our staff and us as managers, I think we quickly realised that it isn't actually that hard. But we're only at the beginning of the goal we're trying to achieve – to save the environment."

Across the world, just 10 percent of plastic was reused in 2019. So here, you don't buy water in plastic bottles. Instead, you can fill up at water stations at no cost.

Panagiota Koutsofta manages this exciting project. She's really happy – the amount of plastic they've saved already is huge. It's equal in weight to 23 Boeing 737 aeroplanes.

Panagiota Koutsofta: "We have succeeded since the beginning of the project to reduce the use of single-use plastics – adding up to the weight of 23 aircrafts Boeing 737. Therefore, our goal is to reduce the use of more plastics – why not maybe adding up to the equivalent weight of thousands of aircrafts, why not!"

Visitors can also help collect rubbish on the beaches. They look for small pieces of plastic, and cigarette ends. The information about what's found is then sent away to a scientific centre. It's studied to develop new laws to keep the environment safe.