‘Clean Beach Combers’ collect 1 million litres of rubbish!

Over the past 10 years volunteers clearing up litter along the Flemish coast have collected 1 million litres of rubbish– enough to fill a 100-metre-long swimming pool.

What began 10 years ago as a local initiative has grown into a major grassroots movement. The volunteers gathered at the Zeeheldenplein in Ostend earlier this month to celebrate not only their anniversary but also the symbolic millionth litre of rubbish.

“That’s about 1,000 cubic metres of rubbish,” explains founder Tim Corbisier. “You could compare that to a swimming pool 100 metres long, 10 metres wide and 1 metre deep.”

“We estimate that over the years, between 10,000 and 15,000 different people have taken part in our clean-up campaigns.”

“We’ll carry on until there’s nothing left to clear up”

These are impressive but also sobering figures. “That’s right,” says local hero Tim. “In the early days, we really did collect mountains of rubbish. Our mission statement says that we’ll carry on until there’s nothing left to clear up.”

"Of course, that’s an unattainable ideal, as the seabed is still littered with rubbish, but it is a worthy goal. As an organisation, we must ensure that our volunteers have to clear as little rubbish as possible by systematically eliminating the sources of the rubbish."

Hope for the future

According to Tim, the Proper Strand Lopers’ efforts are indeed yielding visible results. “Here and there, we can already see that the situation is improving. Of course, there’s always room for improvement, and more volunteers also mean more rubbish that can be cleared. But we are noticing that the amounts of rubbish are not increasing any further. That gives us hope.”

Volunteers meet up every evening at 7:30PM on the Small Beach in Ostend to set off in group to tackle the mountain of waste beach guests have left behind during the day despite the many rubbish bins on the beach.