Keep Australia Beautiful Week (KAB Week)

Keep Australia Beautiful Week (KAB Week) is held at the end of August each year, and was developed by Keep Australia Beautiful to remind people about the simple things they can do in their daily lives to reduce their impact on the environment and encourage action.

In 2011, KAB Week will be held from Monday 22 August to Sunday 28 August and will focus on the need to help keep our waterways litter free.  Keep Australia Beautiful will also be announcing the results of its annual National Litter Index during the week.

According to Keep Australia Beautiful spokeswoman, Lara Shannon, "It is estimated that about 80 per cent of marine debris is from land based source with food and drink wrappers, cigarette butts and other litter being left on our beaches or reaching the ocean and rivers through run-off from storm water drains."

This is an avoidable environmental problem so this year's campaign aims to bring the issue home to all Australians by showing the damaging effect this litter has on our waterways, and the direct impact it has on the health and safety of marine wildlife.

Schools are being encouraged to help promote the message, with students and teachers being encouraged to get involved by creating marine animal 'litter art' displays, supported with litter facts and research. Template media releases will be available to download and distribute to their local media to help spread the message amongst the local community.

Local councils and businesses can also download campaign posters to display locally to highlight the impact litter can have on our environment.

The Hungry Jack's Bag It & Bin It program is the Principal Sponsor of KAB Week and will also support this message in-store with posters, trayliners and staff involvement to remind its customers of the need to dispose of their packaging waste responsibly.

Resources will be available online at www.kab.org.au by the end of July.