'This should make a formidable partnership uniting and empoweringgroups from Bangalore to Bermuda and Berlin to Beijing in common cause,' he added of the initiative with the giant Internet search engine. 'Let us hope this global Google community's effort may go further and  persist beyond the International Cleanup Weekend. It may evolve into a new forum and network for ideas sharing on a wide range of challenges from local cleanups to community based solutions to such pressing issues as climate change.'

The 'Clean Up the World Weekend', held this year on 13 and 14 October, is led by Sydney based Ian Kiernan, who set out to clean up Sydney Harbour after a yacht race left him appalled by the amount of rubbish choking the world's oceans.

Joint action on the Cleanup Weekend is part of a series of projects between UNEP and Google Inc. Last year, Google Earth featured 'UNEP: Atlas of our Changing Environment', offering satellite images of 100 environmental hotspots from around the world and showing the dangers facing them. UNEP and Google encourage everyone to plan their own cleanup close to home, wherever they think there is the biggest need for it.