On the coast of Philippines people found a dead whale with 40kg of plastic bags inside its stomach.

Workers at D’Bone Collector Museum recovered the Cuvier’s beaked whale east of Davao City earlier in March.

In a Facebook post, the museum said the animal was filled with the plastic they have never seen in a whale.

There were 16 rice sacks in its stomach, as well as multiple shopping bags.

The museum will post a full list of the items found in the whale over the next few days.

Darrell Blatchley, the museum’s founder and president told CNN that the whale was not prepared for that amount of plastic. “It was so big, the plastic was beginning calcification.”

The use of throwaway plastic is a particular problem in some South East Asian countries, including the Philippines.

Five Asian nations – China, Indonesia, the Philippines, Vietnam and Thailand – accounted for up to 60% of the plastic waste that ends up in oceans, according to a 2015 report by environmental campaigner Ocean Conservancy and the McKinsey Center for Business and Environment.

The UK government revealed a report this year that the level of plastic in the ocean could triple in a decade if no steps are taken to curb litter. No one knows how more whales should died before people take action.