High-stakes negotiations got underway at the United Nations (UN) Office in Geneva on Tuesday to agree on a legally binding treaty to curb plastic pollution, attended by delegates from nearly 180 countries.
“The world wants and indeed needs a plastic conventional treaty because the crisis is getting out of hand and people are frankly outraged,” UN Environment Programme (Unep) Executive Director Inger Andersen said.
According to Unep, unless an international accord is signed, plastic production and waste are projected to triple by 2060, causing significant damage, including to people’s health.
Malawi is among the countries grappling with plastic waste despite a law being in place that prohibits the production, sale and use of thin plastics.
Switzerland’s top environment official, Katrin Schneeberger, echoed the call for a legally binding treaty, insisting that plastic waste “is choking our lakes, harming wildlife and threatening human health.”
“This is more than just an environmental issue, it is a global challenge that demands urgent and collective action,” Schneeberger said.
Speaking to journalists on the sidelines of the treaty negotiations, she underscored that there was “no call for a production cap” by producing countries.
Supporters of a deal have compared it to the Paris Climate Accord in terms of its significance.
They have also pointed to the pressure allegedly being brought to bear against a deal by petrostates, whose crude oil and natural gas provide the building blocks of plastics.
“We will not recycle our way out of the plastic pollution crisis. We need a systemic transformation to achieve the transition to a circular economy,” Andersen said in previous comments on the need for global regulations on plastics.
With 10 days of talks scheduled on the treaty at the UN in Geneva, supporters of an accord hope that the deal will cover the full life cycle of plastics, from design to production and disposal.
The treaty should “promote plastic circularity and prevent leakage of plastics into the environment,” according to the text now guiding negotiations led by the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee.
The Unep-led talks follow a decision in 2022 by member states to meet and develop an international legally binding instrument to end the plastic pollution crisis, including in the marine environment, within two years.
The scale of the problem is said to be massive, with straws, cups and stirrers, carrier bags and cosmetics containing microbeads just a few of the single-use products ending up in our oceans and landfill sites.
Any treaty signed in Geneva is expected to be sufficiently robust to accommodate the needs of all countries of the world, whose approaches differ regarding plastic design, production, waste and recycling.
It will also have to stand the test of time, Andersen said.
A legally binding treaty to curb plastic pollution would compel signatory nations to take concrete actions to address plastic pollution, ranging from production and design to waste disposal and recycling.
Another relevant international agreement is the Basel Convention, a treaty on hazardous waste, which was amended in 2019 to focus on plastic waste.
This amendment restricts the movement of plastic waste between countries, especially from wealthier nations to poorer ones, where it often ends up polluting the environment.
Despite having a law that bans the production, sale and use of thin plastics weighing less than 60 microns, the materials remain on the market and in use across Malawi.
The law is intended to curb plastic pollution by targeting what environmentalists call one of the most pervasive and harmful forms of plastic.
“Walking through our cities, one can’t help but see plastic bags littering the streets, tangled in trees, and polluting streams,” Lilongwe University of Agriculture and Natural Resources Deputy Vice Chancellor Agnes Mwangwela said during a recent webinar on the issue.
“What once seemed like a harmless convenience has become one of the most persistent environmental threats in Malawi,” Mwangwela added.
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