Cleanup Slovenia: 28,000 people remove 77 tonnes of rubbish

Joining World Cleanup Day were 134 Slovenian municipalities or 63% of all in the country. More than 13,000 children from 114 education institutions were among those who rolled up their sleeves.

Having obtained data from two-thirds of the municipalities that took part, Ecologists without Borders estimated on Friday that waste was removed from 68 illegal dump sites.

The campaign was accompanied by the Clean Coast campaign in which the most common types of rubbish were registered. Once again the "winner" was cigarette butts.

At the global level the campaign was joined by 15 million volunteers in 158 countries.

In Slovenia the campaign was held for the third and last time, because Ecologists without Borders believe awareness raising should become more effective to prevent such a large scale pollution.

Out of the rubbish collected on Saturday, volunteers made all the letters of the Slovenian alphabet. Photographs of the letters will serve to make virtual awareness raising messages.

"The world's cleanest script will be published online for everyone to use it to put their environmental messages into words," the NGO said.

In 2010 the Slovenia Cleaup campaign featured 270,000 volunteers or 13% of the population. They collected more than 14,800 tonnes or 78,000 cubic metres of waste.

Two years later 289,000 volunteers or 14% of Slovenia's population cleaned up 15,600 cubic metres or 4,500 tonnes of waste.