Useful information
Prime News delivers timely, accurate news and insights on global events, politics, business, and technology
Despite the result of Friday, the plastics treaty does not seem to be dead. Virtually all countries expressed interest in continuous negotiations: the delegate of the European Union Jessika Roswall said he would not accept “A dead treaty” – And many used their microphone time during the closing plenary to remember others what is at stake.
“We cannot ignore the seriousness of the situation,” said a Madagascar negotiator. “Every day, our oceans and ecosystems and communities suffer the consequences of our inability to do decisive and unified actions.” The delegate of Tuvalu, the election of Pepetua Latasi, said that not representing a treaty means that “millions of tons of plastic waste will continue to be thrown into our oceans, affecting our ecosystem, food security, livelihoods and culture.”
Even so, without a change in the format of the negotiations, particularly around decision making, it is not clear if the additional discussions will be fruitful. The norm around “consensus -based decision -making means that the threat of a vote cannot be used to push the stubborn countries away from their red lines; unless the decision -making by a majority vote is introduced, so it is unlikely that this dynamic will change.” This meeting showed that the consensus is dead, “said Bjorn Beeler, executive director of the International Pollutant Elimination Network, a coalition of health and environmental organizations.” The problem is not the problem.
Other non -profit organizations and defense groups organized several silent protests during Geneva conversations that raise this point, showing the signs that said: “The consensus kills ambition.”
Senimili Nakora, one of Fiji’s delegates, said during the closing plenary that “it is worth looking for consensus if he moves us forward, not if he stops the process.” Switzerland negotiator Felix Wertli said that “this process needs a waiting time” and that “another similar meeting may not bring the advance and ambition that is needed.”
Other countries raised broader concerns about “the process” for which the negotiations had proceeded. The meetings had been “non -transparent”, “opaque” and “ambiguous”, they said during the plenary, probably referring to unclear instructions that had received from the Secretariat, the bureaucratic body that organizes the negotiations.
Conger Andersen, executive director of the UN Environment Program, told reporters on Friday that at least it had been useful to listen to the countries to articulate their red lines more clearly. “Everyone has to understand that this work will not stop, because plastic pollution will not stop.”
The plastics industry, which has opposed to control plastic production and eliminate groups of hazardous chemicals, said it would continue to support a treaty that “keeps plastics in the economy and out of the environment.” Marco Mensink, secretary of the Council of the International Council of Chemical Associations, said in a statement: “While not concluding a global agreement to take into account plastic pollution is a lost opportunity, we will continue to support efforts to reach an agreement that works for all nations and can be implemented effectively.”
