International negotiations against the proliferation of plastic waste ended on Sunday, November 19, in Kenya, against a backdrop of disagreement over the scope of the treaty and the frustration of environmental non-governmental organizations (NGOs) over the lack of concrete progress.
Negotiators from 175 countries spent a week at the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) headquarters in Nairobi trying to find common ground on a draft treaty to address the growing pollution problem. plastic.
The stakes in these negotiations were high because plastic, resulting from petrochemicals, is everywhere: waste of all sizes is already found at the bottom of the oceans and on the tops of mountains. Microplastics have been detected in blood or breast milk.
If the different parties agree on the need for a treaty, they differ on the merits. NGOs are calling for a 75% reduction in production by 2040, while oil-producing countries and plastics industry lobbies are pushing harder for recycling.
Debates taken “hostage”
After the discussions concluded, UNEP welcomed the “substantial” progress made thanks to the presence of almost 2,000 delegates.
During this week of negotiations, delegations put “more ideas on the table, filling the gaps (…). We now have a document, a draft text, which covers a much broader range of ideas,” the spokesperson for the International Council of Chemical Associations, a major lobby, told AFP. who advocates for the interests of the plastics industry, Stewart Harris: “I think it’s been a useful week. »
A different story for several environmental NGOs who have accused certain countries, notably Iran, Saudi Arabia and Russia, of having engaged in “obstruction”. “Unsurprisingly, some countries are blocking progress, playing procedural maneuvers,” assures AFP Carroll Muffett, director of the Center for International Environmental Law (CIEL).
The civil society alliance GAIA, for its part, accused UNEP of having supervised “an undisciplined and tortuous meeting” which allowed a minority to take the debates “hostage”. “Compromising the needs of those most affected to satisfy the desires of those who profit from the problem is not a feasible strategy,” deplores Graham Forbes of Greenpeace.
For NGOs, time is running out and a binding treaty is necessary because plastic pollution is expected to get worse: annual production has more than doubled in twenty years to reach 460 million tonnes. It could triple by 2060 if nothing is done. But only 9% of plastics are recycled. Plastic also plays a role in global warming: it represented 3.4% of global emissions in 2019, a figure which could more than double by 2060, according to the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).
“Scary impact”
Ahead of the discussions, around 60 countries – led by Rwanda, Norway and the European Union – expressed concerns about this trend and called for “binding provisions in the treaty to restrict and reduce consumption and production » of plastic.
But during public sessions, several countries were reluctant to support a reduction in plastic production, and divisions broke out over whether the treaty was binding or voluntary. “We are not here to end plastic, we are here to end plastic pollution,” declared Sunday, after his election, the new Ecuadorian president of the International Negotiating Committee (INC), Luis Vayas Valdivieso, while lamenting the “scary impact” of plastic on the environment.
The Nairobi meeting is the third of five sessions in an accelerated process aimed at concluding the negotiations next year. After the Kenyan capital, discussions are expected to continue in April 2024 in Canada and conclude in South Korea at the end of 2024.
This major rally comes a few weeks before the kick-off of the COP28 on climate in the United Arab Emirates, the aim of which is to achieve a reduction in greenhouse gas emissions and help developing countries cope. to the consequences of climate change, after a year marked by devastating weather events.
