WE’RE MAKING A STAND ON PLASTIC AT INC-5 IN BUSAN

Lai Cheng November 27, 2024 0 Comments
Mageswari Sangaralingam (middle) of CAP & SAM in Busan, South Korea. She is among the Malaysian civil society organizations attending the INC-5.

“Plastics continue to be among the main pollutants globally. We need to break free from plastic. We need a strong Global Plastics Treaty.” ~ Consumers Association of Penang (CAP) Chief Executive and Sahabat Alam Malaysia (SAM) honorary secretary Mageswari Sangaralingam.

CAP and SAM are part of the IPEN: for a toxics-free future Friends of the Earth International Global Alliance for Incinerator Alternatives (GAIA) team now at the 5th and final round (INC-5) of the Plastics Treaty negotiations (25 Nov-1 Dec 2024), in Busan, South Korea to advocate for a robust treaty.

CAP research officer Ung Jun Min in Busan for the same purpose.

In March 2022, the United Nations Environment Assembly decided on a mandate to create the world’s first Plastics Treaty, a legally binding international law aimed at reducing plastic pollution worldwide, and covering the full life-cycle of plastic.

Plastic is a growing crisis with devastating impacts on the environment, human health, human rights, environmental justice, the rights of Indigenous Peoples, biodiversity, and climate. Global actions to address this crisis are urgently needed.

For decades, industries and governments who stand to gain from increased plastic production have used a focus on waste management as a strategy to distract policymakers and the public from the need to cut plastic at the source. The plastic treaty process cannot be another example of this devastating cycle. No matter how much money and time the international community throws at clean-ups, better recycling, waste management, and other downstream approaches, the more new plastic is being produced, the more impossible it will be for these damage-control measures to keep pace.

Activists, including from Malaysia, urge reduction in plastic production.
The call is clear: “Reduce plastic production”, urge activists in Busan.

Without regulatory interventions, plastic production is projected to increase dramatically, resulting in increasing climate, pollution, and health problems. For the Global Plastics Treaty to be effective in reversing the tide of plastic pollution, mechanisms and solutions to address it need to exist within climate and planetary boundaries. This treaty is an opportunity to get it right and open a path for comprehensive national policies to regulate plastic production and consumption.