Marine litter abundance and composition on Chilean beaches, registered by the Científicos de la Basura citizen science program

Data set generated by means of citizen science, which contains the abundances of the principal litter items registered on Chilean beaches every four years from 2008 to 2020, as well as in 2021. Specifically, the data set contains the numbers of macrolitter items (> 2.5 cm) counted within 3m x 3m sampling stations positioned within the surveyed beaches, grouped according to different material categories (such as papers, plastics, cigarette butts, among others). The data set also contains the sampling dates, the names and coordinates of the surveyed beaches, the zone and region where they are located, the nearest coastal city or town to each beach, the name of the school or the type of volunteers group that conducted each sampling, the total sum of anthropogenic litter items within each sampling station, and the mean abundance per square meter.