A “first version” of the future international treaty against plastic pollution must be drafted by November, decided the 175 countries gathered in Paris after five days of laborious negotiations.
“The International Negotiating Committee (INC) requests its chairman to prepare, with the assistance of the secretariat, a draft of the first version of the legally binding international treaty”, which will be examined in November at the third meeting of this committee in Nairobi, with a final treaty still in view by the end of 2024. This is the resolution, proposed after a final meeting led by France and Brazil, which was adopted in plenary session Friday evening at the Paris headquarters of Unesco.
“There is no more intervention on this point: here is what has been proposed, is it decided? asked INC President Gustavo Meza-Cuadra Velasquez. Without objection from the floor, he then adopted the text, dropping his hammer to the applause of the delegates.
A week of tense negotiations
This positive outcome follows a “laborious start to the week”, “a lot of nit-picking” and “slightly dilatory manoeuvres” from certain countries, in the words of the French Minister for Ecological Transition, Christophe Béchu, on Friday morning.
The negotiators, meeting since Monday, had not been able to get to the heart of the matter until Wednesday evening after two days of blocking of Gulf countries, China, Brazil or India, on the use or not of the vote in case of lack of unanimity during the future examination of a draft treaty. Resolution of the controversy was postponed.
A major challenge
The 175 countries gathered in Paris for the second of five negotiating sessions aimed at developing a legally binding treaty by the end of 2024, covering the entire plastic life cycle.
The principle of this treaty, eagerly awaited given the growing scale of the plastic crisis in parallel with the climate and biodiversity crises, was agreed in February 2022 in Nairobi, at the headquarters of the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP ). The stakes are high: annual production has more than doubled in 20 years to reach 460 million tonnes. It could triple by 2060 if nothing is done.
The countries must agree despite diverging ambitions and under the opposing pressure of certain industries, supported by oil-producing countries, and NGOs. After the next meeting in Kenya, negotiations in April 2024 will continue in Canada to be concluded in South Korea at the end of 2024.