As it stands, there's no nationwide regulation on sanctions for those caught littering in Switzerland; this is regulated by individual Swiss cantons and local councils.
Fines in the canton of Bern, for example, vary between CHF 80 and CHF 300, Thurgau recently hiked fines for throwing a cigarette butt away to CHF 300 from CHF 50 previously, while several cantons had no littering ban in place, Swiss daily Blick reported.
But the Federal Council now want to introduce a standardised system across the country. According to their new plans, which are under consultation until 16th October, police will be able to issue fines to anyone over the age of 16 who's caught dropping litter or abandoning rubbish in public.
The Council hopes to introduce a tiered system, with the level of fine depending on the size and type of litter.
For example, if you're caught throwing away just one piece of rubbish – or leaving it behind – then you could be issued a flat CHF 100 fine. And the size of the waste makes no difference, either. It would be CHF 100 whether you're discarding a cigarette butt or a broadsheet newspaper.
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The next step up is CHF 200. This applies if you leave behind two or more bits of litter.
The maximum CHF 300 fine would be issued for larger waste, anything between 35 and 110 litres – the size of a large rubbish bag.
If more litter than that is left behind – abandoning large items by the side of the street, for example – then the punishment is prosecution and fines up to CHF 20,000.
This is all part of the Federal Council's wider effort to cut waste and encourage people to recycle more. The reform also includes plans to offer a Switzerland-wide collection of recyclable plastic packaging.
Plastic waste is a particular problem for the Alpine country as the majority of this is incinerated, with only around 10 percent of the 127 kilos each resident produces each year recycled, 2023 data from Swiss-based non-profit OceanCare showed.
That being said, Switzerland is actually one of Europe's top recyclers – it recycles just over half of the waste it produces, but that's mainly glass and aluminium.
Part of the problem is due to the quantity of waste it creates: it produces a whopping 671 kilogrammes of waste each year, making it one of the world's largest producers of it, according to 2022 data from Switzerland's Federal Office for the Environment (BAFU).
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