UN talks on plastic pollution have begun which aim to establish the first global treaty to reduce soaring plastic waste. Clip Hamilton from the Australian Marine Conservation Society is attending the talks in Ottawa. She says nations like Australia are trying to remain optimistic about the treaty measures.
Category
📺
TVTranscript
00:00We really need this treaty to be ambitious and to really focus on stopping the production
00:07of plastics so that we're not ending up with another 11 million tonnes of plastics entering
00:13our oceans year upon year upon year.
00:16Was it plastic production that saw the previous meeting end in deadlock with, you know, plastic
00:21producing nations dragging their feet on this issue?
00:25Yes, there's obviously some countries that have very vested interests in continuing the
00:31production of plastics, but there's also a number of countries that have vested interests
00:36in stopping the production of plastics.
00:40Plastics is something that really impacts all of us globally.
00:43It's become a global crisis and it's really impacting all countries, including many small
00:48island developing nations that are bearing the brunt of our continuous plastic use.
00:54So what are the countries, the bigger name countries, amongst those that are dragging
00:58their heels on this?
00:59There's a number of countries in a group called Like-Minded Coalition and they're the states
01:06that are continuing to produce plastics and sort of focusing on end of life solutions
01:15such as recycling.
01:17So Saudi Arabia, I understand, amongst them.
01:19Do they have to be on board?
01:21Does there need to be full consensus or can there be a majority?
01:25It's likely that countries will need to reach consensus.
01:29We'll find that out in the fifth round of negotiations at the end of the year in Korea.
01:37But as well, once we develop this plastics treaty, it's also a voluntary implement that
01:43countries then sign on to.
01:46And I mean, do you think these hurdles can be overcome or do you think it will end in
01:50a situation where those that want to be on board go ahead with it and leave others behind?
01:55We know the vast majority of countries as well as the vast majority of the community
02:00all around the world are really wanting an ambitious treaty.
02:05So I remain highly optimistic that we can get a good result.
02:09And we've had talks in the lead up to this and more to come, as you just said.
02:13So what are the range of outcomes that we could see in Ottawa?
02:16What we're hoping to see in Ottawa is significant progress on the draft treaty.
02:21We're at zero draft at the moment.
02:23We really need to reduce the number of options on the table and get that 70 pages of text
02:30down to something that can actually be negotiated and then implemented, as well as wanting to
02:37see some intersessional work between the end of negotiations here in Ottawa and the fifth
02:43session in Korea.