A high street supermarket has vowed not to sell plastic baby wipes in pledge to help the environment.
Tesco, which was the first retailer to ban both plastic bags and microplastics, will no longer buy, sell or produce wet-wipes made from plastic.
The move responds to calls to ban the plastic wipes and it is hoped other retailers to follow suit.
A Tesco spokeswoman told The Times : “There is no need for wet wipes to contain plastic so from now on we will no longer stock them if they do.”
The supermarket chain is the UK’s largest supplier of the products and sells of 75 million packs of wet wipes a year.
This works out as more than 200,000 a day.
They are convenient for parents but have become become a target for environmental campaigners
Many wipes use plastic fibres which makes unable to break down and unrecyclable.
Tesco will continue to stock i plastic-free wipes and those made by eco-friendly brands including Waterwipes and Rascal + Friends.
The chain said its it will aim to to make lavatory wipes plastic-free from next month and own-brand of pet wipes plastic-free by the end of 2022.
Campaigners have long called on supermarkets to cut the amount of goods wrapped in plastic.
Friends of the Earth said the wipes contributed to “the tide of plastic waste that pours into our environment every year, threatening wildlife and blighting our neighbourhoods”.
Its pledge follows a similar curbs on wipes by health store Holland and Barrett.
The health retailer announced a complete ban on the sale of all wet wipe products from its 800 UK and Ireland stores
And all wet wipe products and variants were replaced by environmentally friendly and sustainable alternatives by end of September 2019.
Millions of wet-wipes are sold in the UK every year, with uses spanning make-up removal and hand sanitisers to surface cleaners.
But EarthWatch Institute and Plastic Oceans UK claims, 9.3million wipes are still flushed down toilets every day in the UK
This damages marine life and creates huge costs for people from sewer blockages.
Joanne Cooke, head of beauty at Holland & Barrett, told Inews: “The true extent of wet-wipes’ impact on water systems” had been highlighted by ‘Fatbergs’ “made up of predominantly wet-wipes”.
She added: “The impact of single-use plastic on the earth is very evident… there are a variety of eco-friendly alternatives to wet-wipes that are just as easy, efficient, and safe-to-skin.”
Jo Ruxton, founder of Plastic Oceans Foundation, said at the time: “Single-use plastic items represent a major part of this problem and this destruction will soon be irreversible if the world doesn’t make a change.”
Waitrose and Sainsbury’s insisted their own wipes were 100% plastic-free.
Nappy makers Huggies said it hoped to be plastic-free by 2025.
