Data for: Legacy community science data suggest reduced beached litter in response to a container deposit scheme at a local scale

Marine debris is causing significant environmental harm. Legislation is
being implemented to reduce litter, including schemes like container
deposit legislation that incentivize the return of commonly littered items
for recycling. While there is a suggestion that these schemes reduce
litter, no study has examined the long-term impact on the local
environment before and after implementation. This study analyzes community
science data from 8 years prior to the implementation of a container
deposit scheme, paired with 3 years of data afterwards, to assess the
scheme's effectiveness at a local scale. Although using legacy
datasets limits the generalizability of the conclusions compared to
dedicated studies, the findings strongly indicate that container deposit
schemes effectively manage targeted containers but have little impact on
overall waste abundances. Long-term datasets like these are invaluable for
assessing the impact of management efforts.