Air Canada is joining forces with leading environmental organisation 4ocean to remove waste plastics and trash from the world's oceans and coastlines.

The new partnership - announced last month on Earth Day 2019 - marks an important milestone in the airline's plastic reduction strategy and creates opportunities for Air Canada employees to participate in coastal clean-ups in 2019.

As part of its ongoing plastic reduction efforts, Air Canada last year identified a number of opportunities to eliminate, replace, reduce or recycle is single-use plastics. The 35 million plastic stir sticks used on aircraft and in lounges will be the first single-use plastic to be eliminated in mid-2019, and later this year the airline will start removing the outer plastic bag from approximately 1.8 million Business Class and Premium Economy Class amenity kits, bringing its total single use plastic items removed from on-board to 36.8 million.

Air Canada's partnership with 4ocean is just one of a raft of environmental initiatives the airline is pursuing, and in 2018 the airline's efforts were recognised when Air Transport World named it the Eco-Airline of the Year.

Meanwhile, TripAdvisor has honoured Air Canada as the North American airline with the best Business Class in its 2019 Travellers' Choice Airlines awards.

The prestigious accolade recognises Air Canada's Signature Class, the premium cabin of the airline's wide-body aircraft. Introduced last year and available on all services to and from Australia, along with select North American flights, Signature Class offers an end-to-end premium experience, with lie-flat seats, priority services, exclusive lounge access and best-in-class comfort and amenities including award-winning in-flight entertainment.

Travellers' Choice Airlines winners are chosen based on airline reviews submitted on TripAdvisor Flights or via one of TripAdvisor's review collection partners.