MUNICH/OTTAWA – In late November, the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee on Plastic Pollution met for the first time. The United Nations Environment Assembly established the INC with a well-defined mission: to create the first-ever legally binding global agreement on plastic pollution. The fact that delegates and observers finally met to have this discussion is welcome. However, the meeting results are just the beginning of addressing the scale or scope of the problem.
Plastic pollution threatens people’s health and endangers the environment. Plastic causes harm throughout its entire lifecycle, beginning with resource extraction and continuing after disposal.
But the problem is not just plastic itself. Plastic contains over 10,000 chemicals, more than a quarter of which are toxic to humans and wildlife. In the absence of a global requirement that companies make known precisely which chemicals are in which plastic materials and goods, what we know about plastic in our lives is dictated by the whims of individual manufacturers and national legislatures. As a result, we are ignorant of the full extent of the problem. No one – from workers facing occupational hazards to parents trying to make healthy choices for their children – has all the information they could and should have.
Plastic does not affect everyone equally. Vulnerable groups like low-income families, Indigenous communities, and people of colour are especially at risk. For example, the vulnerable and disadvantaged are likelier to live or work near petrochemical manufacturing facilities and refineries, exposing them to air, water, and soil pollution from the toxic chemicals used to manufacture plastic products.
This inequality exists within and between countries. Plastic products are often made in developing countries, transported to developed countries, and then returned to developing countries as waste. It is not only the last stage of plastics’ lifecycle that creates pollution and endangers communities. Plastic production itself is hazardous.
Consider the textile sector, where workers create clothes from synthetic plastic fibres. The workers are largely unaware of the toxicity of the chemicals they use while assembling skirts and shirts for people an ocean away. They do not have all the necessary information to understand the risks they face from doing their jobs. There is also an apparent gendered component to this, given that women dominate the textile sector in developing countries.
But while people are unfairly and unevenly affected by plastic pollution, no one is spared. Plastic pollution does not respect borders. Women everywhere use menstrual products containing plastics with chemicals that pose a direct risk to their health. Children worldwide, including in wealthy countries, play with cheap plastic toys containing unknown chemicals.
Given the high-stakes challenges facing the first INC, it is disappointing that delegates did not even manage to adopt procedural rules. Until they do, more substantive negotiations will be delayed.
There were some small successes. The presence of observers permitted corridor conversations in which they could help delegates better understand the link between plastic, chemicals, and health. This was reflected in some delegates’ statements, highlighting the need for transparency on plastic chemicals.
That is not nothing. But it is also not enough.
Delegates will have another chance in May 2023. Representatives of governments worldwide will convene in Paris for the INC’s second meeting. Their mission will again be to work toward a legally binding agreement on plastic pollution.
Delegates cannot simply retread the same ground as in November. Delegates will need to demonstrate their governments’ commitment to reducing plastic production. Together, they will need to consider the entire plastic lifecycle and its dangers to communities, people, and the environment.
Perhaps most importantly, they will need to remember that these meetings aim to establish a global, legally binding instrument, not to shrug and sigh and let countries follow mere voluntary guidelines, effectively allowing business as usual to continue.
Negotiations on plastic pollution need to be more efficient and ambitious in Paris next year. Delegates must act as though they are saving the world—and if they get this right, they will.
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