Butt Litter Prevention Projects Community Impact Survey
08 Jul 2021
As part of the Cigarette Butt Litter program’s monitoring and evaluation framework, and as agreed with NSW Department of Health, the NSW Environment Protection Authority (EPA) conducted targeted research to measure the community impact of interventions funded by round one of the Butt Litter Prevention Grants, including any unintended or negative impacts.
This will inform the development of subsequent rounds and provide indications of how the Cigarette Butt Litter Prevention Program is likely to impact on local communities.
The survey examined whether the program encourages smoking, and whether there are any impacts on the wider non-smoking community in those areas, including risks such as smoke drift.
The research uncovered strong support for the changes introduced by the grant projects.
91% of all community members agreed that it is appropriate to provide butt bins and signage to help smokers, with just 5% disagreeing. This rose to 96% among current smokers.
About four in five of all community members surveyed agreed that the new butt litter projects:
- helps keep the area free of cigarette butt litter (84%)
- helps raise awareness of issues associated with cigarette butt litter (81%)
- makes it less socially acceptable for smokers to litter their butts (79%).
Credit: NSW EPA
77% of all community members surveyed agreed that infrastructure and signage in the area is useful in keeping second-hand smoke away from people who don’t want to breathe it in.
This high proportion is a clear indicator that the community supports designated smoking areas to contain second-hand smoke in a chosen location.
The full report can be downloaded at the link below.
Cigarette Butt Prevention Program Community Impact Research Report - 8 July 2021 (PDF).
