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Keep cigarette butts off the streets

By Li Xing (China Daily)
Updated: 2009-04-09 07:40

London/Paris: People in China always suspect something is going on when a large crowd gathers.

That's why I was curious when I saw crowds in the narrow streets outside the Park Lane Mews Hotel when I first passed by in a taxi last week. The next day, I saw the same swarm when I looked out the window of this homey but classic English inn.

Upon further investigation, I found these people were gathering in front of pubs or bars, having drinks and chatting before going off to dinner. Later my friend Marie told me it is not only because a drink outside in the warm spring weather is especially enjoyable, but because most of these people are smokers and can no longer smoke indoors.

Ever since Ireland became the first European country to ban smoking in pubs, bars, and restaurants, the other members of the European Union have followed suit, gradually outlawing smoking indoors in public places.

But the ban has not deterred people from puffing in the streets. Those of us who do not smoke still get to inhale second-hand smoke when we walk down the streets of London or Paris or Beijing.

I was especially exasperated when I saw cigarette butts scattered around the steps leading down to the subway at Place D' Italie in Paris. Walking down the Avenue Des Gobelins from Place D' Italie, I noticed cigarette butts filling the crevices of iron grates that cover the soil around the beautiful poplar trees.

The litter continued as I turned right and found myself in front of Eglise Saint-Medard. I walked further down the narrow Rue Mouffetard, lined with restaurants, bars and take-out places of various ethnicities. The butts on the ground were obvious, stuck between the road and the curb or wherever a crowd had gathered.

There is a small square where Rue Mouffetard and Rue Lacepde meet. I found more butts on the ground surrounding a fountain in the center of the square, even though there were seven litter bags nearby. The heavy plastic bags do not seem to hold up too well. Trash was spilling out of some bags and covering the ground where bags had been ripped.

I even found butts at the foot of the Histoire de Paris plaque in front of Le Facult de Droit, the University of Paris, opposite the gigantic Pantheon building.

"So what?" you may say. The litter I saw in Paris accounts for only a miniscule percentage of the 4.5 trillion cigarette butts that wind up on the streets of the world every year. That's 1.5 billion kg of trash.

That is an appalling number of butts. Researchers say the nicotine contained in 200 butts is enough to kill an adult. It takes between 1 and 15 years for a cellulose acetate filter to dissolve. Meanwhile, these butts may be washed away, polluting the waterways in no small way, or they may remain stuck in the ground or in grates, poisoning the trees.

I must confess I haven't paid attention to cigarette butts in the streets of Beijing or other major cities in China. Apparently, the problem is not as serious in Chinese urban centers as it is in Paris, thanks to the hard work of migrant workers who serve society as street cleaners.

We should do what we can to make their job easier. Cities should provide durable litter boxes designed to accommodate cigarette butts. Meanwhile, smokers should show some discipline. They're already poisoning themselves, and the rest of us in the process. They shouldn't add the environment to their victims.

E-mail: lixing@chinadaily.com.cn