Speaker 1: Welcome to zero. I'm Akshatrati this week a plan for
Speaker 1: plastic pollution. Climate change is a pollution problem. We spew
Speaker 1: too much greenhouse gases into the air and it heats
Speaker 1: up the planet. The trouble is greenhouse gases are invisible,
Speaker 1: and that can make it very hard to describe the
Speaker 1: scale of the problem. The same is not true of
Speaker 1: plastic pollution, which is everywhere. Plastic that is littered on
Speaker 1: the land, washes into the oceans, slowly breaks down into microplastics,
Speaker 1: and then travels to the furthest corners of the globe.
Speaker 1: In twenty twenty two, a study was published showing that
Speaker 1: microplastics had been found in antarctics. Now it's also been
Speaker 1: found in every organ of the body, including the brain.
Speaker 1: Sick is abundant and very cheap, and on current trends,
Speaker 1: the amount we produce is set to triple by twenty
Speaker 1: sixty from four hundred and thirty million tons a year
Speaker 1: today to one point two billion tons, according to the OECD.
Speaker 1: And if that plastic is not managed, we'll see much
Speaker 1: more of it polluting our lands, oceans and bodies. It's
Speaker 1: also not just about human health. There's an impact on
Speaker 1: climate One point two billion tons of plastic would produce
Speaker 1: as much as four billion tons of greenhouse gases, so
Speaker 1: there needs to be a fix.
Speaker 2: The deal has to ensure that we reduce the avoidable
Speaker 2: and the eliminatable, if there is such a word. But
Speaker 2: this cannot be and some parties would like it to
Speaker 2: be just a recycling treaty.
Speaker 1: That's Inger Anderson, head of the United Nations Environment Program,
Speaker 1: and for the last eighteen months she has been working
Speaker 1: on a new global treaty to reduce plastic pollution. At
Speaker 1: the end of last year, the first version of the
Speaker 1: agreement was sent to negotiators. It's called the Zero Draft,
Speaker 1: and it calls for a reduction of plastic pollution from
Speaker 1: start to finish, not just increased recycling, but reduced production
Speaker 1: by eliminating unnecessary single use plastics. It all goes to plan.
Speaker 1: The legally binding treaty is due to come into action
Speaker 1: by twenty twenty five. I caught up with Inger at
Speaker 1: COP twenty eight to hear about how negotiations are going,
Speaker 1: why big companies are dropping out of their plastic promises,
Speaker 1: and why a lack of cash is as pervasive a
Speaker 1: problem as plastic pollution.
Speaker 3: Inger, Welcome to the show.
Speaker 2: Well, thank you for having me.
Speaker 3: Now we talk about pollution. There is a lot of
Speaker 3: invisible pollution, some we have to deal with in the atmosphere,
Speaker 3: but plastic pollution is very visible and it's been growing
Speaker 3: and becoming a menace all around the world. So over
Speaker 3: the past eight months, you are trying to figure out
Speaker 3: a way in which governments around the world can come
Speaker 3: together and finally have a legally binding way to address
Speaker 3: plastic pollution.
Speaker 2: Correct, how is it going. Well, We've had three rounds
Speaker 2: of negotiations. The last one happened in Nairobi just a
Speaker 2: couple of weeks back. There's a zero draft text out
Speaker 2: of the treaty text in the UN speak, it will
Speaker 2: be a treaty, but it may have other names, the
Speaker 2: instrument as we refer to it, until it's baptized.
Speaker 3: If you know what I mean when you say zero draft,
Speaker 3: what does that mean?
Speaker 2: So that means you know. The first two sessions the
Speaker 2: Intergovernmental Negotiation Committee i NC one and i n C two.
Speaker 2: The first one was spent on organizational issues and to
Speaker 2: listen to member states and other parties on their views.
Speaker 2: Second one ditto, and it got really bogged down in
Speaker 2: silliness of procedural issues. I shouldn't say silliness, but there
Speaker 2: was quite a lot of frustration that the procedural issues
Speaker 2: took so long. But sometimes that's the case. When you
Speaker 2: have one hundred and ninety three be your best friends negotiating,
Speaker 2: it takes time. But in the meantime, of course, we
Speaker 2: had an open submission from all governments and partners and
Speaker 2: other interested parties where they sort of submitted in response
Speaker 2: to what was called an options paper. These submissions were received,
Speaker 2: hundreds of submissions based upon which a draft tree D
Speaker 2: text was drafted. That's a zero drafted from A to Z.
Speaker 2: I mean, it's an actual you can it's on the
Speaker 2: website unit website and it was issued in September, so
Speaker 2: that when parties gathered in Nairobia a couple of weeks ago,
Speaker 2: they had that text to refer to.
Speaker 3: And the goal is there'll be i INC four and
Speaker 3: five over the next year, and by twenty twenty five
Speaker 3: there will be a legally binding treaty to add.
Speaker 2: That's certainly what enabled resolution as it's called back the
Speaker 2: United Nations Environment Assembly, which is sort of the Environment
Speaker 2: General Assembly. If you know happens every two years. It's
Speaker 2: under unip's auspices. It happens always in Nairobi, which is
Speaker 2: where our headquarters is. And in the junea United Nations
Speaker 2: Environment Assembly that happened in twenty two that was a
Speaker 2: decision to negotiate a legally binding instrument to end plastic
Speaker 2: pollution COMMA, including in the marine environment. So it's from
Speaker 2: the entire production line, if you like, from beginning to end,
Speaker 2: not just cleaning up the oceans, not just recycling, but
Speaker 2: the entire production chain, life cycle approach. And that's what
Speaker 2: this zero draft text reflected at the last I INC
Speaker 2: three in Nairobi. So there was a lot of comments
Speaker 2: from different interests, I have to say, and based upon
Speaker 2: which now the next round will be the true negotiation.
Speaker 2: The idea, as you rightly say, is to finish this
Speaker 2: by the end of twenty twenty four.
Speaker 3: You said one hundred and ninety three best friends. Well,
Speaker 3: right now, given where multilateral negotiations are going, generally, take
Speaker 3: the climate negotiations that happen at COPP, they don't really
Speaker 3: act like best friends. So why do you think there
Speaker 3: is more agreement among parties among these hundred and ninety
Speaker 3: three countries on plastic pollution than there is on carbon pollution.
Speaker 2: I mean, I'm not saying that they're in agreement. I
Speaker 2: am saying that I have one hundred and ninety three
Speaker 2: bosses whom I'm trying to enable, for whom I'm trying
Speaker 2: to enable this negotiation. We can look upon it like that. However,
Speaker 2: there are also many other stakeholders who are inside the
Speaker 2: negotiating room. They're activists, there, indigenous people the waste because
Speaker 2: they're scientists. There's private sector, et cetera. Why will this
Speaker 2: be more successful? I would like to believe. I think
Speaker 2: there's a popular demand for this. You know, so every
Speaker 2: child saw what was it ten years ago? The straw
Speaker 2: and the turtle snows. Every child has seen and now
Speaker 2: they're a little bit older, but the belly of the
Speaker 2: bird full of plastic, the whale full of fishing gear.
Speaker 2: Every person, especially who lives in the global South, where
Speaker 2: sanitation collection of municipal solid waste is largely absent, knows
Speaker 2: that it is the poorer people who live with waste.
Speaker 2: Knows that it is the drains that are supposed to
Speaker 2: carry the rain water out to sea that gets full
Speaker 2: of garbage and therefore blocks and courses inundation understands that
Speaker 2: if they burn it, their children gets asthma and other
Speaker 2: diseases from burning plastic, which contains thousands of chemicals, many
Speaker 2: of which are highly toxic. So this understanding is very real.
Speaker 2: I think what we are seeing is very interesting from
Speaker 2: all sides, including sort of left and right, both aisles
Speaker 2: of proverbial aisles in politics, that there is a desire
Speaker 2: to find a solution. The on ramp for the solutions
Speaker 2: are slightly different because some would rather focus on a
Speaker 2: recycling side and some would rather focus on a let's
Speaker 2: find a way of reducing overall production. But there is
Speaker 2: a desire to find solutions.
Speaker 3: How would you roughly structure what is inside the zero
Speaker 3: draft and why that document as it exists, and it
Speaker 3: will of course be modified, but at least is a
Speaker 3: good start for addressing the problem of plastic pollution.
Speaker 2: I think first of all, what we would say is
Speaker 2: that the deal has to ensure that we reduce the
Speaker 2: avoidable and the eliminatable, if there is such a word,
Speaker 2: and that we need to think about the redesign, that
Speaker 2: we need to think about the switch to non plastic substitutes,
Speaker 2: that we need to strengthen the systems for reuse, refill,
Speaker 2: repair and recycle. But this cannot be and some parties
Speaker 2: would like it to be just a recycling treaty. As
Speaker 2: I say, we didn't need a treaty for having a
Speaker 2: fire brigade, we don't need a treaty for having a
Speaker 2: recycling system. It's obvious and it's something that we just
Speaker 2: need to do. The zero draft has to target primary polymers.
Speaker 2: It has to target chemicals of concern because we will
Speaker 2: end up having to recycle and the recycling. Therefore, we
Speaker 2: need to know what's in the stuff that we are recycling.
Speaker 2: But we also have to ensure that there's a degree
Speaker 2: of justice. There are twenty million wastepickers today who make
Speaker 2: their living being the global workforce of sanitation. As hopefully
Speaker 2: we will switch to a different type of waste management.
Speaker 2: The wastepickers, when I speak to them, their aspiration is
Speaker 2: to not work on the dump but to do house
Speaker 2: to house collection. If today I'm collecting metal, tomorrow I'm
Speaker 2: collecting plastic. You understand what I'm saying. So that it
Speaker 2: becomes separated at sauce to the extent that you can
Speaker 2: get willingness to separate in their households. That's something that
Speaker 2: we need to think about. And on the funding, there
Speaker 2: has to be a funding mechanism. Finally, I will say
Speaker 2: extended producer responsibility is something that is in the treaty.
Speaker 2: That means that there's some sort of obligation of the
Speaker 2: brand owners to have a take back scheme. Brand owners,
Speaker 2: most of them are very interested in this, but they
Speaker 2: want any equal level playing field. There can't be that
Speaker 2: in one market it's not and in one market it is,
Speaker 2: because then it becomes unequal. We will also need to
Speaker 2: ensure that we can move stuff across boundaries that today
Speaker 2: is considered hazardous and tomorrow week it becomes wealth as
Speaker 2: we move into recycling. Then, finally, if I may legacy
Speaker 2: pollution as what we refer to what is already out
Speaker 2: there in our oceans, our rivers, our waterways. A small
Speaker 2: island state Tuvalu, Fiji, et cetera that lives off of tourism.
Speaker 2: Just as an example, who is responsible for that beach cleanup?
Speaker 2: If I met the minister from the Saeychelles and he
Speaker 2: told me the costs of the beach cleanup just to
Speaker 2: enable tourism, these are extraordinary amounts, so there has to
Speaker 2: be some justice around this in the treaty as well.
Speaker 3: One of the features of global negotiations on environmental issues
Speaker 3: in general is that they've become the place where the
Speaker 3: divide between the global North and global South is most apparent.
Speaker 3: And if you want those solutions to apply everywhere, Global
Speaker 3: South countries typically require financing to be able to get
Speaker 3: those solutions going. Now, a new report from the OECD
Speaker 3: says that to be able to deal with just prevention
Speaker 3: of plastic from leaking into the environment would require more
Speaker 3: than a trillion dollars of investment in non OECD countries
Speaker 3: in the zero draft and in the work that you
Speaker 3: do and end up with this treaty, how is finance
Speaker 3: fitting into trying to get these solutions? Is going in
Speaker 3: all the places it must?
Speaker 2: So I think we need to be careful because of
Speaker 2: course I live on the African continent. I'm privileged enough
Speaker 2: to live there. And it is correct that infrastructure solid
Speaker 2: waste infrastructure is largely absent from many many African countries
Speaker 2: as an example, as well as in South Asia, et cetera.
Speaker 2: And the costs of an engineered landfill with lead chased
Speaker 2: channels with salting conveyor bills. All of that, and with
Speaker 2: transfer stations and the collection vehicles and all that is considerable.
Speaker 2: But don't put that burden on the Plastic Treaty. You know,
Speaker 2: the Plastic Treaty can't carry that. But the Plastic Treaty
Speaker 2: in its draft text now speaks to the imperative of
Speaker 2: investments in solid waste. Their countries will have to think
Speaker 2: about the fact that once you have the investment of
Speaker 2: the infrastructure piece and the trucks and what have you,
Speaker 2: someone has to pay the bills to pay an I wouldn't.
Speaker 2: You wouldn't if you live in Islam, you would dump
Speaker 2: because you have very little money and your priority is
Speaker 2: to feed your kids and necessities. And the luxury paying
Speaker 2: for your garbage to be taken away is too high.
Speaker 2: So you need to find some degree of cross subsidies
Speaker 2: for that which people are willing to pay for. But
Speaker 2: on the plastic itself, the reduction itself, and the alternatives itself, no,
Speaker 2: there we are not talking these extraordinary costs. What we
Speaker 2: need to think about because the poor people who may
Speaker 2: not be able to afford to buy a big container
Speaker 2: of stuff, will buy whatever they need in a sachet.
Speaker 2: So that's where we've seen some really neat innovation, for
Speaker 2: example El Grammo in Chile, where you own a bottle
Speaker 2: with your little microchip and you go to the store
Speaker 2: and you buy a grammo the grams that you can afford.
Speaker 2: If you can afford twenty grams, you press the button,
Speaker 2: you get the twenty of whatever. So whatever it is
Speaker 2: that you need, and you are done and at bottle
Speaker 2: as yours forever. It's this kind of innovation that we
Speaker 2: need to leapfrog into so that we can get rid
Speaker 2: of the plastic I'm not denying the OCD study, but
Speaker 2: we need to think of them. And that's why I'm
Speaker 2: speaking to all the ifi's development banks, et cetera. They
Speaker 2: really need to lean in on the solid waste management.
Speaker 1: After the break, how to get companies to do the
Speaker 1: work on cutting plastic pollution.
Speaker 3: Well, the science of climate change has been clear for
Speaker 3: a long time, and it's only become more and more certain.
Speaker 3: But that's not allowed for progress to happen at pace.
Speaker 3: That is not to say progress can't happen under the
Speaker 3: UN system. We had the Montreal Protocol back in nineteen
Speaker 3: eighty seven, another Unit convention, indeed, very clear mandates to
Speaker 3: try and reduce there a set of gases that were
Speaker 3: causing the ozone layer to break apart and all kinds
Speaker 3: of problems that follow from that. We've seen the result
Speaker 3: of that show over the next thirty years. The osen
Speaker 3: hole is currently filling up and filling up quickly. So
Speaker 3: these things can work. But the same group of countries
Speaker 3: that have caused a problem on the climate sphere are
Speaker 3: also the group of countries that are trying to cause
Speaker 3: a problem on the plastics treat And one of the
Speaker 3: ways in which they do it is they say energy
Speaker 3: is needed for development. They were able to insert that
Speaker 3: phrase in the Zero draft that was published earlier this year,
Speaker 3: where they said, yes we lend plastic pollution as long
Speaker 3: as it supports sustainable development. How are you going to
Speaker 3: deal with those forces?
Speaker 2: So, first of all, there are many pieces to what
Speaker 2: you said. Obviously, the producers of plastic plastic comes from
Speaker 2: virgin raw polymer. Obviously, hydrocarbons ie oil and gas are
Speaker 2: the foundational element to produce new virgin raw polymer, which
Speaker 2: often is delivered in small nodules and can be then
Speaker 2: made into anything from airplanes to your toothbrush or whatever.
Speaker 2: The point is that many, many, many countries, way beyond
Speaker 2: the producers, have a plastics industry. Frankly, I was looking up.
Speaker 2: It's hard to find a country that does not have
Speaker 2: a plastics industry, even if it's not very big. But
Speaker 2: these are jobs, and so some of the countries are
Speaker 2: concerned about Okay, yes, this is fine, but what happens
Speaker 2: as we shift to alternatives? Will they only be made
Speaker 2: in the global north? Where's the R and D? Is
Speaker 2: there going to be justice? Will we have access to
Speaker 2: the new I mean, these are real issues that are
Speaker 2: concerning on the issue of new raw polymers. Obviously, yes,
Speaker 2: the countries that produce the polymer could be argued that
Speaker 2: they have an interest to keep producing. On the other hand,
Speaker 2: there is an understanding even amongst their populations that recycling
Speaker 2: and recycle content is critical. They too live on oceans,
Speaker 2: they too experience this. They too have a population that
Speaker 2: objects to plastic in the waste stream. And what the
Speaker 2: zero draft speaks to elimination of the single use the
Speaker 2: single use packaging. We can do a lot, and yes,
Speaker 2: obviously they're commercial interest, but I think the other force
Speaker 2: is quite strong, and you rightly pointed out the Montreal protocol.
Speaker 2: And if I could just go back and remind listeners
Speaker 2: that in their seventies, when the theory that fluorinated gases
Speaker 2: were in fact what depleted the ozone layer, it was
Speaker 2: highly disputed by very large American companies. There was hearings
Speaker 2: in the Senate where extraordinary things were said about how
Speaker 2: this would be impossible to face out, face down, face whatever.
Speaker 2: This wasn't a word at the time, but you know,
Speaker 2: eliminate from the production. At the time, the world was told,
Speaker 2: your food will spoil, your vaccines will go off, and
Speaker 2: you will be very hot because they're not going to
Speaker 2: be any cooling. And yet the industry was able to
Speaker 2: step in. There are many many alternatives, and some are
Speaker 2: with us, but we're just not using them fast enough,
Speaker 2: and others we need to invent. And what's very interesting
Speaker 2: is that we are seeing many of the brand owners
Speaker 2: actually it's detracting from their shareholder value and from their
Speaker 2: company employee pride, and obviously from their brand. When their
Speaker 2: packaging is bobbing around in the water or lying on
Speaker 2: the side of the street. It is not a good
Speaker 2: thing nowadays. And so I think brand owners, many of
Speaker 2: whom I speak to at the CEO levels. I also
Speaker 2: seek to lean in. I say to those countries that
Speaker 2: are holding on to plastic in the places where it's replaceable.
Speaker 2: We still need it for planes, trains, cars, appliances, electrical
Speaker 2: and all of that. But that kind of plastic doesn't
Speaker 2: end up in the environment. It's a packaging that does.
Speaker 2: I say to those brand owners. Look at the solar
Speaker 2: industry PV. The early bird got the worm. Those who
Speaker 2: started investing and now controlling that market, step in and
Speaker 2: lead in this way so that you can be part
Speaker 2: of that innovation way, because it will come like it
Speaker 2: came on cooling, like it came on photovol takes.
Speaker 3: It's clear that there are solutions and that there are
Speaker 3: places where these solutions have started to work. One solution
Speaker 3: that has popular and has scaled up is the plastic
Speaker 3: bottle fee, where you pay a little bit when you
Speaker 3: buy the bottle and if when you return it to
Speaker 3: the right place, you get some money back. These solutions exist,
Speaker 3: they need to be scaled up. But if you just
Speaker 3: look at companies. The Ellen MacArthur Foundation listed one hundred
Speaker 3: and fifty companies in twenty eighteen that said they would
Speaker 3: report on and reduce their plastic pollution by twenty twenty five.
Speaker 3: But five years on twenty companies have dropped out many
Speaker 3: major brands and they are unwilling to either meet the
Speaker 3: criteria or even take part in what was an obligation
Speaker 3: that seemed pretty reasonable. Why do you think a treaty
Speaker 3: which is being talked about by governments will actually get
Speaker 3: companies to do so.
Speaker 2: I grew up in Denmark. We always had a collect scheme.
Speaker 2: When I was a kid. It was glass and if
Speaker 2: you found a glass bottle as a little five year old,
Speaker 2: you would pick it up. It would be like fifty cents,
Speaker 2: I mean, and you could go and get a lollipop
Speaker 2: for that or whatever. So and now it's also plastic
Speaker 2: and you put them into a machine either by way
Speaker 2: to buy individual code, and out pops a little thing
Speaker 2: that you then used to pay for your groceries. I
Speaker 2: could never walk past a can or a bottle in denmarket.
Speaker 2: It's like walking past money lying on the ground. And
Speaker 2: so what these individual companies did. They put up their
Speaker 2: hands and we're willing to do this, but if there
Speaker 2: is no system by which I take it all to
Speaker 2: the grocery shop or the supermarket, and everything, whether it's
Speaker 2: pepsi or Coca Cola or Procter and Gamble or it
Speaker 2: has to go through the same system. Honestly, it's hard
Speaker 2: for people to this one goes here, that one goes there.
Speaker 2: It's a little bit like when you stand with your
Speaker 2: ice cream wrapping in front of the recycling and joy, okay,
Speaker 2: is this here or is it there? And where does
Speaker 2: it go? The system has to be one that has
Speaker 2: been enabled across a jurisdiction, normally a country or a
Speaker 2: group of countries. If that is in place by legislation,
Speaker 2: the national level logic follows. It's just how it works.
Speaker 3: Are there countries in the world where there has been
Speaker 3: legislation put in place to deal with plastic pollution that
Speaker 3: you think are good case studies to follow? You mentioned Denmark,
Speaker 3: Well are examples. Perhaps I would look.
Speaker 2: At Rwanda and Kenya as the I mean Rwanda came
Speaker 2: first and Kenya on its heels, and now a number
Speaker 2: of countries on the continent of Africa. Rwanda banned plastic bags.
Speaker 2: You're going to have to double check, but like two
Speaker 2: thousand and seven and Kenya is shortly thereafter, and significant
Speaker 2: finds follow. If you're caught with a plastic bag significant
Speaker 2: in terms of and or jail time. The National Environmental
Speaker 2: Management Authority of Kenya, for example, it's sort of similar
Speaker 2: to drug busts, except it's illegal plastic bag production busts,
Speaker 2: and the criminals are lined up and on Twitter and
Speaker 2: you see them all and shamefaced and so and so forth.
Speaker 2: You cannot when you land in Nairobi, the air announcement
Speaker 2: will come. If you have a plastic bag, you got
Speaker 2: to leave it on the plane, do not take it
Speaker 2: into the country. That's how it is. And it's phenomenal,
Speaker 2: I'm telling you. And so you know it's only bags, yes,
Speaker 2: but it's a very very good beginning and people are
Speaker 2: very aware of it. And we don't have like you
Speaker 2: have in other poor countries where solid waste is absent,
Speaker 2: plastic bank trees, you know, where they have blown onto trees,
Speaker 2: not at all.
Speaker 3: It just does not exist.
Speaker 2: And so that's I mean, the beautification, the absence of
Speaker 2: the drainage clogging and so on. Not to say Kenya
Speaker 2: doesn't have plastic pollution, because it does because of the
Speaker 2: packaging for cleaning products and so on. But this is
Speaker 2: the next step. Kenya, for example, it's just rolling out
Speaker 2: an EPR legislation on this exact thing. Rwanda similarly and
Speaker 2: other countries do. So, yes, it's not just the North
Speaker 2: and that's what I will probably finish with if we're
Speaker 2: coming up towards the end. That's what I would like
Speaker 2: to really stras that this is not a North South story.
Speaker 2: It was Peru and Rwanda that sponsored the resolution at
Speaker 2: the United Nations Environment Assembly, and then they got others
Speaker 2: to jump in the Nordic see, some of the Europeans obviously,
Speaker 2: the Pacific Islands and more and more to support that resolution.
Speaker 2: So it is not just a North South story. It
Speaker 2: is really a story lit by the global south where
Speaker 2: the global nrcessor Yeah, we can get with this, and
Speaker 2: that's quite exciting too.
Speaker 3: Well. I wish you much luck for coming up with
Speaker 3: a global treaty in short order, and I hope we
Speaker 3: can catch up once it's done.
Speaker 2: It will be my pleasure.
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