It's one less form of plastic pollution on beaches and coastlines.

Scotland's ban on plastic-stemmed cotton buds has finally come into force, nearly two years since I first wrote about it for TreeHugger. While most manufacturers have transitioned to paper-handled buds since the change was announced, others have dragged their feet, but this new law will weed them out and force shoppers to make greener choices.

Cotton buds (or Q-Tips, as they're commonly referred to) are a pervasive form of marine pollution. People often flush them down the toilet after use, then they wash up on beaches and coastlines around the world in high numbers. The Marine Conservation Society always includes cotton buds on its top-ten list of beach litter and estimates that its volunteers have collected 150,000 of them over the past 25 years. In the UK, 1.8 billion cotton buds are sold annually.

Roseanna Cunningham, environment secretary for Scotland, is quoted in EcoWatch: