Support for the Killarney Coffee Cup project has fallen, raising questions about how the scheme can continue without help from the Government.

Recent figures from IBAL, published this week, show that a number of businesses are no longer taking part.

Both Irish Business Against Litter and Killarney Chamber of Commerce say a national levy on disposable coffee cups is now needed.

They want a charge similar to the plastic bag levy to encourage customers to use reusable cups.

The Coffee Cup project was started in July 2023 with the aim of making Killarney the first town in Ireland to be free of single-use coffee cups.

At the launch, 25 independent coffee shops and 21 hotels agreed to stop giving drinks in throwaway containers.

Under the scheme, anyone buying a takeaway coffee must bring their own cup or pay a €2 deposit for a reusable cup.

The deposit is returned when the cup is brought back to any business in the network.

Organisers hoped to remove more than one million cups a year from local waste systems.

The project followed complaints from residents and visitors that coffee cups were being found at lakes, car parks and walking trails.

Clean-ups in the national park reported that the cups were one of the most common items collected.

A Government ‘latte levy’ of 20 cent per cup had been promised but has still not been introduced.

Chamber President Johnny McGuire said this delay has made it hard for small operators to stay involved.

Mr McGuire recently met An Taoiseach Micheál Martin to discuss the problem and to press for the levy.

He said the Taoiseach listened carefully, but no date was given for action.

The chamber has also spoken to local TDs, Finance Minister Jack Chambers and Kerry County Council CEO Fearghal Reidy, who has expressed support.

The chamber insists the project is not finished. It hopes other towns will copy the Killarney model if a levy is brought in.

IBAL spokesperson Conor Hogan said the data shows that Coffee cups remained one of the most commonly found forms of litter and was evident in one fifth of all sites surveyed.

“A real disappointment in a generally positive year has been the likely collapse of reusable coffee cup schemes in towns such as Killarney,” said Mr Horgan.

“It is apparent that such schemes will only work with statutory backing.

As our data today bears out, without Government intervention coffee cups will remain an unsightly and entirely unnecessary blot on the landscape across our towns.

The prevarication from Government on the issue is striking, a levy was promised all of four years ago ,and sends out a worrying signal.

Weaning ourselves off single-use coffee cups should not be such a big deal.”