Page 58 - Plastic News Issue August 2025

INTERNATIONAL NEWS
♦ Decision Tree to Prevent Plastic Pollution, a
step-by-step tool designed to help govern-
ments assess plastic products across three
dimensions: design for circularity, local waste
management capacity and socioeconomic
value. The GPPC says the tool guides users
through targeted actions such as redesign,
improved end-of-life treatment or identify-
ing alternatives, based on national circum-
stances and circularity goals.
♦ Industry policy recommendations from the
GPPC to help draft an agreement that is ef-
fective, inclusive and actionable by all coun-
tries.
“The global plastics agreement is an opportu-
nity to move towards a circular economy,” ICCA
Council Secretary Marco Mensink says. “We’ve
seen promising convergence on several key ar-
eas like design, infrastructure and addressing
high-leakage products. We urge negotiators
to seize this moment and bring the agreement
across the finish line. Let’s not let the perfect
stand in the way of the possible.”
The warning
Treaty negotiations were discussed during the
Bureau of International Recycling (BIR) Conven-
tion & Exhibition in Valenica, Spain, in May, and
Alev Somer, the BIR’s trade and environmental
director, warned that talks could grind to a halt
with no consensus.
“Since 2022, we at the United Nations Intergov-
ernmental Negotiating Committee have been
discussing reaching the ultimate goal of a plas-
tics treaty that would address the whole life cy-
cle of plastics and actually, perhaps, support the
recycling industry. This treaty would be address-
58 PLASTICS NEWS
ing plastic pollution not only on land, but also at
sea.”
However, Somer said the “waste part” of the
proposed treaty “is really dividing the negotiat-
ing committee into two groups, with low-ambi-
tion countries, oil-producing countries, pushing
for it to be addressed only at the end of life so
that they don’t have to do any changes in terms
of their production and keep the commitments
light with a voluntary agreement, and high-am-
bition countries pushing for the treaty to be le-
gally binding and covering the entire life cycle of
plastics.”
Describing the progress of treaty talks over the
last several years, Somer said, “Basically, it’s like
the Ottoman march. You make two steps for-
ward and then one step back.”
When BIR Plastics Division President Henk Alsse-
ma asked if there was a real chance of a deal be-
ing signed, Somer said, “I think miracles can hap-
pen. But to be honest, no, I do not frankly see a
binding treaty signed at the end of the session
5.2 unless there is tremendous progress, and
then there might be further negotiations.”
Somer said she had spoken with the secretariat
working on the proposed treaty, who explained
that if no agreement is reached at INC-5.2, the
resources and budget do not exist to continue
the negotiations. Instead, Somer suggested that
more action could be taken through the Basel
Convention on Plastics and other platforms,
such as the Stockholm Convention, where per-
sistent organic pollutants (POPs), could be ad-
dressed to potentially reduce the use of chemi-
cals in plastics.
Source - https://www.recyclingtoday.com
August 2025