I am delighted to again provide a message of support for Keep Australia Beautiful and the Tidy Towns Awards – which are of course celebrating their 30th anniversary in Tasmania this year. Keep Australia Beautiful offers the chance for people to become personally involved with their communities and schools through environmental improvement.
But it’s a movement that is about so much more than clean streets. It’s about building strength in our communities and a shared sense of pride and achievement. I know that towns all over Tasmania vie enthusiastically for the Tidy Towns title each year, because it is such a marker of the spirit that exists within a community.
The Clean Beaches Award reflects the Australian love affair with the sea – a love affair very much in evidence in the beautiful Tasmanian towns that dot our coastline, from Stanley to Dover and from Strahan to St Helens. Tasmania has a good story to tell in the sense of community built up across our State over many decades. The Keep Australia Beautiful Awards have become one of the traditions that nurtures that sense of connection, and builds it more strongly for the future.
These awards encourage our pride in Tasmania and support future generations to take on the challenge to keep Australia beautiful. Congratulations to all the nominees and winners for 2009, and I look to seeing these awards grow and prosper for decades to come.
David Bartlett MP
Premier
The Packaging Stewardship Forum was established in May 2006 as a forum of the Australian Food and Grocery Council. The Forum aims to significantly increase government, industry and community understanding of resource recovery and litter management through the delivery of projects throughout Australia, either directly or in partnership with others. Its focus is on providing cost-effective resource recovery and litter reduction solutions that deliver real and measurable outcomes.
The Forum’s highly successful Do The Right Thing anti-litter campaign has proven to be the strongest litter prevention message since it was implemented, leading to a 70% reduction in litter in NSW between 1979 and 1990. Today Do The Right Thing is stronger than ever, with more than 80% of people recognising that Do The Right Thing means put your waste in the bin. Throughout Australia more than 180 towns and cities are taking the Do The Right Thing message to their communities. The Forum is also a major sponsor of Keep Australia Beautiful nationally, sponsoring Tidy Towns and Sustainable Communities Awards in every state during 2007-08. To find out more about the Packaging Stewardship Forum see: www.afgc.org.au/psf
As a world leading pump and pumping systems manufacturer, Grundfos Pumps has joined with Keep Australia Beautiful to help all Australians achieve improvements in water conservation. The partnership is based on sponsorship of the Water Conservation category of both the Tidy Towns and Sustainable Cities Awards at a national and state/territory level.
These awards identify, acknowledge and promote examples of excellence in local environmental initiatives. Finalists and winners of the awards will help provide best practice case studies and benchmarks that other local communities across Australia can utilise to address water shortages and restrictions.