The project "NaturPutzer" (cleaning the nature) is an initiative of the environmental organisation GLOBAL 2000 in cooperation with both the Austrian Alpine Association Edelweiss and Gebirgsverein. We want to clean up Austria sustainably and to get rid of all the litter. We are drawing attention to the problem, organising campaigns for collecting litter and developing the "NaturPutzer" app in order to discover littered hotspots.
The littering problem
Even though Austria ranges among the leading countries in terms of cleanliness, the problem of littering should not be underestimated. 100 tons of litter per year in the municipalities have to be collected and disposed of, nearly 1000 tons are found along federal and national roads (more accurate figures are not known!).
The app "NaturPutzer"
The app "NaturPutzer" has been created in order to encourage awareness raising in our society and to create a map of wild dumps, so the problem is being documented for the first time in Austria. Data are collected about the types of litter posing a particualr risk in nature and about the actual spots where they occur. Environmental problems should be brought into the spotlight - and hotspots must be detected, so the litter is not left behind at the same spots again and again every year. NaturPutzer is running on the Citizen Science Platform SPOTTERON.