This year, the Philippines passed a critical
national law that advances the legal framework to
combat further plastic pollution.
Titled the “Extended Producer Responsibility”
law, the legislation requires mandatory EPR for businesses with assets worth over ₱100 million.
Not many know the Philippines dominates
global ocean plastic pollution chart at 36 percent, with
an international study showing the Philippines is the
world’s leading contributor to plastic pollution in the
oceans, with an average of 3.30 kilograms per person
per year.
According to the 2021 report of the World
Bank Organization, the Philippines generates a staggering 2.7 million tons of plastic waste annually and 20
percent of which winds up in the ocean, much of it in
the form of unrecyclable, single-use sachets.
This scenario cries out yet once more for
urgent attention as the latest negotiations towards a
global treaty to combat plastic pollution opened in Nairobi this week, with tensions expected as nations tussle
over what should be included in the pact.
Some 175 countries agreed last year to conclude by 2024 a UN treaty to address the plastic blighting oceans, floating in the atmosphere, and infiltrating
the bodies of animals and humans.
Around 60 so-called “high ambition” nations
have called for binding rules to reduce the use and production of plastic, which is made from fossil fuels, a measure supported by many environment groups.
It is not a position shared by many plastic-producing economies, including the United States, which
have long preferred to focus on recycling, innovation and
better waste management.
The draft presenting the various ways forward
will form the basis for the high-stakes deliberations at the
UN Environment Program headquarters in Nairobi.
With more than 2,000 delegates registered,
and advocates from environmental and plastic groups
also in the room, the negotiations are expected to get
heated as the details are hammered out.
Hundreds of climate campaigners, waving placards reading “Plastic crisis = climate crisis,”
marched the other day in Nairobi calling for the talks to
focus on cutting the amount of plastic produced.
We agree with Kenyan President William
Ruto who described plastic pollution as “an existential
threat to life, to humanity and everything in between.”
“To deal with plastic pollution, humanity must
change. We must change the way we consume, the
way we produce, and how we dispose (of) our waste.”
The meeting to debate the future of plastic
comes just before crucial climate talks in the oil-rich
United Arab Emirates later this month, where discussions over fossil fuels and their planet-heating emissions are due to dominate the agenda.
As in the UN negotiations on climate and biodiversity, financing is a key point of tension in the plastic talks.
