Global Plastic Policy Reviews

Generic selectors
Exact matches only
Search in title
Search in content
Post Type Selectors

When referring to any of the results of our analysis and/or its concept and design, please cite us accordingly:
Global Plastics Policy Centre (2024) March A., Salam, S., Evans, T., Hilton, J., Fletcher, S. (editors). Global Plastics Policy Review. Revolution Plastics Institute, University of Portsmouth.

Surfrider Foundation – Hold onto your Butts

View the policy document
Contribution to reducing plastic pollution:
Effectiveness of meeting own objectives:
Strength of evidence: Moderate Available Evidence
Reviewed under framework: Yes

The Hold onto your Butts campaign by the Surfrider Foundation began as a local initiative to reduce the amount of cigarette butts in San Diego in the 1990s. Since then, the campaign has grown to become a global movement.

The campaign began with local beach cleans, and has since grown. This campaign has resulted in policy changes in Tofino, citizen science projects and beach cleans, and new infrastructure to collect cigarette butts. Surfrider have partnered with Terracycle to recycle cigarette butts. These are then turned into garden benches. To date there have been 1,050,00 cigarette butts recycled as part of the Hold on to your Butts campaign. Smoking areas now have a Surfrider recycling canister to collect cigarette butts

(Reviewed in Jan 2022)

Year:

  • 1991

Instrument type:

Voluntary or legally binding:

Scale:

Implementation context:

Point in plastic cycle:

Policy Type:

Help us to refine our reports

We are confident in our research, however, not all evidence is made publicly available which may affect the outcome of the reviews. Let us know if you have research or evidence that can contribute to our analysis, or a policy you think would be valuable to review!

Get in touch

Our methods

Through an analytical framework, we've reviewed over 100 plastic policies. These reviews determine the effectiveness of policies in reducing plastic pollution and we offer recommendations in light of this evidence, to enhance future policy making. You can find out more about our methods on our methods page.

Methods

Guidance

In light of our findings, we've created targeted guidance for Policy Makers, Citizens and Businesses.

Think we've missed something?

We are confident in our research, however, not all evidence is made publicly available which may affect the outcome of the reviews. Let us know if you have research or evidence that can contribute to our analysis, or a policy you think would be valuable to review!

Submit a policy or evidence