The UK government outlawed the manufacture of products containing microbeads in what it says is one of the world's toughest bans on the tiny plastic particles.
Last year the UK joined 11 other countries in passing a microbead ban. The UK ban is significantly tougher than any other piece of microbead legislature currently on the books, entirely banning the manufacture of any product containing microbeads.
This avoids loopholes such as the one in the United States’ ban, which outlawed microbeads in rinse-off cosmetics but failed to prevent them from being used in detergents, sandblasting components, and cosmetics that are not rinsed off the skin.
The UK’s new ban is an excellent step in the fight to reduce our reliance on plastic and sets a higher standard for future microbead legislation. Currently, France, Canada, Italy, India, the Netherlands, New Zealand, South Korea, Sweden, Taiwan, and the United States have also banned microbeads in some capacity and many other countries are currently trying to pass anti-microbead legislation.
