A dead whale was found ashore in the Philippines with 40 kilos of plastic waste in its stomach, activists said on Monday.

A necropsy performed on the 4.7-meter long animal showed that it had swallowed grocery bags and rice sacks, thus forcing it into starvation because it was no longer able to eat, director of D' Bone Collector Museum Inc. told AFP.

"It's very disgusting and heartbreaking," he told the new agency. "We've done necropsies on 61 dolphins and whales in the last 10 years and this is one of the biggest (amounts of plastic) we've seen."

"It could not swim on its own, emaciated and weak," regional bureau director Fatma Idris told AFP.

"(The) animal was dehydrated. On the second day it struggled and vomited blood."