Negotiators' efforts to craft a U.N.-led treaty on plastic pollution ended in stalemate and confrontation with oil and plastic producing nations.
A tense week of talks in Nairobi hosted by Kenya and the U.N. Environment Program closed late on Sunday after failing to reach consensus on a draft text negotiators hope will be comparable to the 2015 Paris climate deal.
The third of five planned round of talks by the U.N.'s Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee for Plastics drew more than 1,900 participants representing 161 U.N. member nations, including the European Union and 318 observer organizations, UNEP said. Some 143 registered lobbyists also participated, according to the Center for International Environmental Law.
The lobbyists joined fossil fuel producing nations such as Saudi Arabia, Russia and Iran in using blocking tactics and campaigning to shift the focus onto more improvements in plastic recycling and other ways of managing waste, rather than imposing binding cuts in plastic production.
The talks also could not reconcile differences over single-use plastics and chemical content amid the more than 500 proposed amendments.
The world produces more than 460 million metric tons a year of plastic – which is mostly made from fossil fuels – and global plastic waste is expected to almost triple by 2060, according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.
'Bullies' had their way
The U.N. General Assembly has called for a treaty that deals with the full life cycle of plastics in a legally binding instrument by the end of 2024. The next two rounds of talks are scheduled to start in April at Canada and in November at South Korea.
"The bullies of the negotiations pushed their way through," said Ana Rocha, global plastics policy director for the Global Alliance for Incinerator Alternatives, "despite the majority countries, with leadership from the African bloc and other nations in the Global South, in support of an ambitious treaty."
Rwanda and Norway are leading a coalition of “high-ambition” governments that aim to eliminate plastic pollution by 2040 that curbs production and restricts some chemicals.
The International Council of Chemical Associations, representing more than 90% of global chemical sales, said "some progress was made" at this latest round talks but "work must be done to accelerate circularity," another term for recycling and reusing plastics.
Despite the stalemate, UNEP's Executive Director Inger Andersen said she was "encouraged by the forward motion" and that negotiators would "continue to be ambitious, innovative, inclusive, and bold" in their efforts.
