McDonald's is most littered food brand

The fast-food chain was found to be the most common brand seen as litter in the snapshot survey of ten city centres and suburbs/out-of-town locations across England. Nationwide McDonald's made up more than a quarter of all fast food litter (29%). Items common as litter were McDonald's burger wrappers, condiment sachets and plastic straws. In second place was the local chippie or kebab shop with 21% of unbranded chip wrappings, polystyrene chip trays and plastic forks. Greggs came in third with the company's pasty and pie wrappers making up 18% of all fast food litter. There was a big drop to fourth place KFC (8%) and fifth place Subway (5%). Keep Britain Tidy surveyors spent two days observing fast food litter in Newcastle, Liverpool, Manchester, Leeds, Sheffield, Leicester, Birmingham, Bristol, Southampton and London. Phil Barton, Keep Britain Tidy chief executive, said: "This is the very first time we have looked at which brands make up littered England. Of the ten cities surveyed the same brands appeared again and again. "We condemn litterers for dropping this fast food litter in the first place but also believe the results have pertinent messages for the fast food industry. "McDonald's, the local chip shop, Greggs, KFC and Subway need to do more to discourage littering by their customers. Fast food makes up a quarter of all litter found on our streets. We want fast food chains to play a more active role in delivering an anti-litter message at the point of sale. "We know from working with McDonald's in the past that the company takes a responsible attitude to its communities by running local anti-litter campaigns. McDonald's has anti-litter logos on packaging, provides litter bins and runs 'litter patrols'. However, McDonald's litter remains all too prevalent on our streets and we'd like the company to do more to tackle the problem. We want all fast food chains to reduce unnecessary packaging and make it easier for customers to do the right thing."