Half-a-tonne of litter was recently found dispersed along Fiordland's shores - and it shows New Zealand has "a lot of work to do" to combat it's plastic problem, says Sustainable Coastlines co-founder Camden Howitt.
The organisation undertook a survey of the region's southwest coastline, including a stretch of its north coast near George Sound, and the findings were shocking.
Roughly 1500 items of litter were discovered along ten 100m stretches of coastline - about half-a-tonne - and 93 percent were plastic products.
Plastic bottles were the second most frequently found piece of litter, many of which had evidently travelled a long way from where they were tossed, Howitt told The AM Show.
"We've got to stop littering, we've got to stop consuming all these plastics," he says.
In recognition of World Ocean Day, Howitt is urging people to reduce their addiction to plastics by identifying one product they can live without in their daily lives and finding a sustainable alternative.
"Remove one piece of plastic from your everyday life," he says.
Watch the full video above.
