The toast of the coast

Sam Judd’s great waste awakening began on a surfing and diving trip to San Cristobal in the Galapagos Islands. He and mate James Bailey had arrived in 2007 looking for fun – and were promptly invited on a rubbish-removal trip. That sounded like an adventure so the pair volunteered and were soon on board the rickety fishing boat that would be their base. Over the next eight days they night-dived with sharks, saw marine iguanas and manta rays – and helped collect 1.6 tonnes of rubbish, witnessing up close the damage society’s waste inflicts on marine eco-systems.

“The amount of plastic was unbelievable,” remembers Sam, now 29. And the dead animals: marine life that had perished by trying to eat or becoming entangled in plastic.

Not long after, over a shot of tequila back on San Cristobal, Sam, James and a third Kiwi friend hit on the idea of organising a huge community clean-up of the island. “We sat there and had a shot and said, right, we’re going to do this thing.”

Sustainable Coastlines was born. Sam and James managed to motivate hundreds of locals to take part. How? “Grunt work. Knocking on doors, sitting down, persuading people, thinking of different ways people could help out, being confident and organised and clear about what I was asking people.”

The recruits netted 7.5 tonnes of rubbish in just one morning.

“Locals were in tears, overwhelmed at what had been achieved,” remembers Sam. “Not because of the amount that was picked up, but the fact that every organisation on the island – who are constantly at loggerheads over policy and corruption – had worked together for the same cause for the first time in history.”

A movement begins 

After the Galapagos clean-up Sam hitch-hiked back to New Zealand on sailboats, determined to continue the work. The perfect Kiwi location presented itself when he spotted debris while commercially free diving for kina (sea urchins) off the coast of Great Barrier Island. And so it was that, over two days in April 2009, 700 people on foot, in boats and kayaks removed 2.8 tonnes of rubbish from the island – enough to fill the baggage hold of a 250-seat ferry, with around 30,000 litres in the hold and more stacked on top.

Recalls Sam: “Some of the volunteers came to help the environment; some for a cheap trip away and others for the sweet after-party, but everyone got stuck in and had an epic time meeting each other and the classic locals.”

Sustainable Coastlines evolved into three strands: clean-up events, public education through seminars and school roadshows, and riparian planting – growing strips of thirsty vegetation along coastlines that act as natural filters. To date, Sam and his team have motivated 22,280 volunteers to remove over 118 tonnes of debris from coastlines and educated 55,269 people with presentations. And while Sam worked for the first two years as a full-time volunteer, today corporate sponsors and charitable grants bring in enough money for four staff.

“Each of our team members average 100 hours a week and we’re paid just above minimum wage for 40 hours,” says Sam. “We believe more funds will come. We could have stopped the momentum by ripping into a whole lot of grant applications but we didn’t; we just kept doing these crazy events because people enjoyed them so much. We’ve picked up more rubbish than half the volume of concrete in the Sky Tower. We can garner respect from the people we approach now.”

The accidental greenie

Sam had never identified as an environmentalist, but much in his past led naturally to this vocation. Wellington-born and raised, he’d discovered surfing while studying law and politics at Otago University and afterwards arranged a student exchange to Mexico so he could learn Spanish and get in some good waves. Back at Otago, he discovered he had a knack for events planning while working in the international student office, and talked his way into a second exchange, this time to Chile. His events planning experience and legal training gave him a head for logistics and the lingo and knowledge to negotiate with the various government, industry and school groups involved in clean-ups. His years of shoestring backpacking made him resourceful, adaptable, adept at thinking on his feet. And this particularly Kiwi combo gives him credibility and rapport with school kids, corporate sponsors and bureaucrats.

Today the team works out of the non-profit’s purpose-built central Auckland 'HQ', which doubles as the Judd family home – Sam and his fiancée Emma, childhood sweethearts who reunited after his travels, have a five-month-old daughter, Juliette, and a retired guide-dog, Keno. Appropriately, the HQ is outfitted almost entirely from salvaged, donated or scavenged materials – a working example of the Sustainable Coastlines recycling and upcycling values.

Reaching the kids

With its HQ humming, Sustainable Coastlines has shifted its focus to education. In one school term alone this year, it took its roadshow to 16,000 school kids.

“I’m particularly passionate about combining educational systems with logistical systems,” says Sam. “You can’t do just one out of the two things: to teach kids what to do with their rubbish you need to have bins, to start up a waste system you have to teach people how to use it.”

A 2009 clean-up organised on Ha’apai Islands, the outer islands of Tonga, illustrated the power of attitudinal change. Not only was the clean-up a huge success, with 3000 of the islands’ 4500 residents turning up to clear 50 tonnes of waste in one day, but the locals recognised the danger rubbish poses with the Prime Minister committing to a waste management strategy for the islands.

Sam’s keen for the organisation to share what it’s learnt about motivating change. “Everyone reacts to different material – some will react to a dead bird full of plastic, others to a dead turtle, some won’t react to stories and images from overseas but they will to local ones. Some people don’t care about animals at all but they care when they find out about how the waste affects their health and their kids’ health. It’s about finding out what makes people tick.”

Given the vast volumes of plastic and other waste that flows or blows into the sea every day, how does he not become dispirited? Feedback from volunteers, and children’s receptiveness to the anti-litter message keep him going, says Sam.

“I still don’t consider myself an environmentalist,” he adds. “Littering is as much a health and social issue as an environmental one. It’s often lack of education and awareness that’s causing it, where people have no pride in the place they live. It’s affecting people’s health through toxins in plastics getting into the food chain, it’s affecting tourism – having dirty beaches is not a good look. And it’s affecting our environment. It’s about motivating people to change their behaviour.”

The filthy five

Since 2008, 22,280 helpers at Sustainable Coastlines events have removed 118.6 tonnes of rubbish from the shore. Here are the five worst waste offenders:

• Plastic of unknown origin (184,986 pieces)
• Food wrappers (151,855 pieces)
• Bottle caps and lids (84,913 pieces)
• Plastic bags (86,802 pieces)
• Polystyrene/foam (80,560 pieces)

You can help!

Love your coastline? Help clean it up.

• Individuals (and bunches of friends) – visit www.loveyourcoast.org to find the next clean-up event in your area.
• Employees – tell your boss about Sustainable Coastlines' highly popular team-building events. They combine teamwork with great results for the environment that businesses are proud to use in their sustainability reporting. Email [email protected] for more information.