Financial Times: Oil producers accused of stalling progress on plastics pollution
Oil-producing countries have stalled efforts to draft the first legally binding international agreement on cutting plastic pollution, according to official observers at UN talks in Nairobi.
The global gathering in the Kenyan capital was aimed at making progress on a deal for plastic equivalent to the 2015 Paris climate agreement.
Clean-up: plastic waste is cleared at a lagoon in Abidjan, Ivory Coast
But the talks ended on Sunday without a plan to begin work on a draft treaty after some countries proposed shifting the focus to waste management rather than scaling down production.
Blocking tactics by countries that argued against framing a draft were “disastrous” and would prevent meaningful work being carried out before talks resumed, said Graham Forbes, head of the Greenpeace delegation.
“More than halfway through the treaty negotiations, we are charging towards catastrophe,” Forbes said. “You cannot solve the pollution crisis unless you constrain, reduce and restrict plastic production.”
Saudi Arabia, Russia and Iran were among countries arguing that binding cuts to plastics production should not be within the scope of the negotiations, according to people present at the talks and documents released by the country delegates. Instead, they proposed a voluntary, “bottom-up” approach focused on improvements to plastic recycling.
Russia argued that production of primary polymers, the fossil fuel-based chemicals from which plastics are made, “must not be discussed within the [UN plastics] process and shall not be part of the future instrument”.
Iran said any treaty should “exclude the stages of extraction and processing of primary raw materials . . . since no plastic pollution is generated [then]”.
Last year’s UN environment assembly resolution on tackling plastics pollution, which initiated the talks, said the “full life cycle” of plastics, including upstream production, should be addressed in a legally binding instrument by the end of 2024.
This could eventually create an agreement akin to the Paris climate deal — under which countries agreed to try and limit the rise in global temperatures to below 1.5C — but focused on addressing the risks to the climate, biodiversity and human health posed by the 400mn metric tonnes of plastic waste the UN environment programme estimates is produced globally every year. Less than a tenth of this is recycled.
Before the latest round, a so-called high-ambition coalition including Canada, the EU, Norway and the United Arab Emirates had called for any draft to address binding cuts to production.
Any curb on production would be a blow to fossil fuel companies. The market for the material is expected to drive a growing share of oil and gas revenues in coming years, offsetting weakening demand as the world transitions towards renewable energy, the International Energy Agency has said.
According to an IEA analysis, petrochemical products such as plastics and fertilisers are projected to make up more than a third of the growth in oil demand to 2030 and nearly half to 2050.
Industry was out in force in Nairobi, pushing for options that did not require production cuts. The non-profit Centre for International Environmental Law advocacy said 143 fossil fuel and chemicals lobbyists registered for the event.
The industry said support was needed for “circularity”, in which products are reused, recycled or maintained, and it was investing billions of dollars in infrastructure and packaging design.
Ana Rocha, global plastics policy director of the Global Alliance for Incinerator Alternatives, said: “The bullies of the negotiations pushed their way through. Plastic is burning our planet, destroying communities and poisoning our bodies. This treaty can’t wait.”