Industry voice: Why negotiations on a global plastic pollution treaty broke down

In March 2022, the United Nations Environment Assembly (UNEA) agreed to develop a legally binding global instrument on plastic pollution, with the aim of finalizing it by the end of 2024. The treaty is being negotiated through a series of Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee (INC) meetings hosted by the UN Environment Program.

It failed to reach a deal in South Korea last year. And talks in Switzerland earlier in August was supposed to be a last ditch effort.

But Negotiations to reach a major treaty to end growing plastic pollution around the world fell apart in Geneva, adjourning with no immediate plans to resume.

The treaty could have sweeping implications for how plastics are designed, produced, used, and managed worldwide. It is intended to address plastic pollution across the lifecycle of plastics, though there is deep disagreement over what that scope should mean in practice.

To get the industry’s point of view, Al Arabiya Business’s Naser ElTibi speaks to Stewart Harris, spokesperson for the International Council of Chemical Associations (ICCA), who attended the meetings in Geneva, in order to get a better understanding of the chemical industry’s point of view.