Talks at the UN headquarters in Geneva to reach an agreement to end plastic pollution came to a haphazard conclusion last week, with 184 countries unable to agree to a deal.
Nations rejected two versions of the draft treaty presented by the meeting’s chair, Luis Vayas. Due to their lack of ambition, countries described them variously as “unacceptable” and “repulsive”, unusually strong wording for a diplomatic space.
The meeting, called INC5.2, was an extension of what was supposed to be the concluding meeting, INC5.1, in Busan last year.
While many are disappointed by the result, they also point to over 100 countries refusing to accept what they saw as a weak treaty. “It’s better we take the time to get something good, and it’s good that countries held that line in the face of pressure to get a deal,” said Christina Dixon, a campaign lead at the Environmental Investigation Agency, a UK non-profit.
However, Dixon added that there are “serious limitations” to continuing to negotiate under the status quo. Currently, a small group of petrochemical-producing nations, now including the US, are blocking majority ambition. “Countries will need to find a different dynamic and a different approach” to reach any kind of future agreement, she said.
Why did talks grind to a halt, and what is the path forward for the treaty process?
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Pacific Small Island Developing States and Micronesia, we’ve been clear about that from the start. The pressure should not be from the timing, or the perception that the talks may fail. The pressure should be from considering the needs of those who are going to be harmed by plastic.
Dennis Clare, negotiator, Micronesia
What happened in Geneva?
The momentum for the plastics treaty began at the UN Environment Assembly in 2022, when 175 countries signed a resolution to draft a legally binding agreement to tackle plastic pollution across its full lifecycle.
Since then, fault lines have formed between a majority of countries and a minority of oil-producing states. The majority want the treaty to include legally binding measures to reduce plastic production and to regulate plastic chemicals and problematic plastic products. The minority, including Saudi Arabia, Russia and Iran, want it to focus solely on waste management.
In Busan last year, over 100 countries backed ambitious provisions. But the draft remained riddled with brackets, signaling disagreement mainly with this minority group, and no time left to resolve it.
The Geneva gathering was a second attempt to find common ground, and seal a deal. The meeting also brought new allegiances into play. The world’s largest plastics producer China appeared to start siding more with ambitious countries. Meanwhile, under the Trump administration, the US started to visibly align with Saudi Arabia, Russia and Iran, contributing its influence as the world’s second largest plastics producer.
As negotiations grew increasingly fraught over the week, Sivendra Michael, Fiji’s lead negotiator, acknowledged that “we have to compromise on some things.” Michael was also lead negotiator on finance for the Pacific Small Island Developing States, among the most ambitious nations.
Getting limits on plastic production into the treaty has been a mainstay for ambitious countries throughout the treaty negotiations, with oil-producing minority states rejecting the idea. In the final two days, Fiji, as well as Norway and Mexico, all signalled to Dialogue Earth they may be willing to sacrifice a section on limits, if other sections to regulate chemicals and problematic plastics could be strengthened in turn. Bolstering these other areas, went the logic, could create different routes to manage plastic production rates.
But when the chair’s draft was released on 13 August, there was widespread shock. “We knew it wasn’t going to be a perfect text. But I think people across the spectrum were surprised by its weakness,” said Dennis Clare, a negotiator for Micronesia.
Nothing was legally binding. The section on production limits had flipped to focus only on voluntary pollution controls. There were no measures to regulate chemicals. And sections on plastic-product design appeared to be voluntary.
“It’s not even a treaty, it’s an empty shell,” Camile Zepeda, Mexico’s head of delegation, said afterwards. “If we were to adopt something of the sorts, it would basically just be on reporting on national measures that are voluntary. That’s it.”
The draft also lacked obligations to contribute to financing needed to implement the treaty, making it “a waste management framework without any clear funding,” according to Clare. “That puts the whole burden of work on the countries downstream who are cleaning up waste that didn’t even come from their region.”
The draft was a step too far for most countries, over 100 of which plainly rejected it in the subsequent plenary meeting. The UK described it as the “lowest common denominator,” the EU called it “unacceptable” and said “it does not meet the minimum” needed to tackle plastic pollution, while Panama labelled it “repulsive,” adding, “This is not ambition, it is surrender.”
The crisis forced negotiators back into meetings to revise the draft, pushing the talks over the 14 August deadline. When a new draft came out just before 1am on Friday 15, some elements had been returned to the text. But the language was still largely voluntary, it lacked restrictions on problematic plastic products and chemicals, and was weak on finance.
Overall, it failed to rejuvenate delegates and in the final plenary called just five hours later, countries largely refused the draft as the basis for ongoing negotiations. By this point, many civil society organisations, journalists and even delegates had already left.
The catch in consensus
The weakness of the draft treaty shows the growing challenge of trying to reach consensus, the guiding star of most multilateral agreements.
In Geneva, many countries in the ambitious camp said they repeatedly compromised and crossed their red lines to try and reach this goal, but oil-producing nations barely budged. “It takes two to tango, and only one side, the majority, was making any concessions,” said Neil Tangri, science and policy director, with the Global Alliance for Incinerator Alternatives.
Countries could break out of this bind, and move things forward in line with what the majority wants – by voting. While viewed as a last resort in consensus-driven multilateralism, rules allowing voting are commonplace, and usually require a two-thirds majority to push things forward.
Voting hasn’t been applied in the plastic treaty process despite several stalemates. This is because at INC2 in Paris, a minority of oil-producing countries rejected those rules. That echoes what happened at the start of the UN climate negotiation process in the 1990s where a group of oil states blocked the voting norm before COP1.
Vote-blocking is seen as a stalling tactic from oil-producing states protecting their interests. While taking a vote risks alienating these countries, trying to do everything by consensus allows even a single country to veto the majority, resulting in weak or watered-down agreements.
In fact, some blame the lack of voting for dragging down ambition throughout the UN climate negotiation process, and worry the plastics treaty process faces the same threat. Delegates at INC2 in Paris were not able to resolve their differences on voting, and parked the issue until a later date. But in the increasingly time-pressured negotiating environment, no one has since been willing to reopen the question.
In a world where state interests intertwine with fossil fuels, many now think voting is critical for environmental multilateralism to succeed. (The Centre for International Environmental Law, a non-profit, revealed that 224 lobbyists registered for the Geneva talks, several on state delegations.) In fact, a major sticking point in Geneva was over a section to ensure voting could be used at future plastic treaty COPs, which had support of over 120 countries but was rejected by a minority, said Dixon.
“So for example, even though 103 countries supported a production-reduction proposal, they might be willing to drop the global target if they knew they could adopt a global target later. But without having the possibility to vote agreed, they’ve got no assurances. We find ourselves in the climate space, where we would just be hamstrung by [the need for unanimous] consensus.”
Another option beyond voting is for ambitious countries to break free from blockers, and forge a treaty outside of the UN system.
This involves some risks, including that it might not draw in enough countries, or may not attract major plastics producers and exporters like China, which could weaken its utility. But other international agreements have thrived by exiting the UN, such as the Mine Ban Treaty, which has grown to include over 160 countries and has significantly reduced the production and use of landmines worldwide.
If negotiations don’t progress, it’s not the end of the road. Countries can try other routes to reach their goal. “It is not unprecedented, it is possible,” said Alexandra Harrington, chair of the IUCN World Commission on Environmental Law Agreement on Plastic Pollution Task Force. “I do think if we continue to see this type of deadlock, and such an inability to move forward in the negotiations, there could indeed be much more interest in going outside.”
Urgency on the ground
Amid the uncertainty, dozens of civil society organisations in Geneva highlighted the damage a weak treaty would do to the most vulnerable. When the chair’s first draft was published, dozens gathered in near 40°C heat to urge delegates to stand for ambition, as they filed into the plenary hall.
Prem Singh Tharu, member of the International Indigenous Peoples’ Forum on Plastics, told Dialogue Earth the initial text “was completely disrespectful to Indigenous Peoples,” who were mentioned only once in the first draft, down from 11 times in a previous version. Indigenous lands and livelihoods are often disproportionately affected by plastic production and waste.
Many advocates from Indigenous and black frontline communities had travelled from the US, where hotbeds of petrochemical production in places like Port Arthur, Texas, produce high levels of cancer-causing chemicals including benzene.
“Just down the road from my community, they’re building an eight to ten billion dollar petrochemical plant to produce more plastics,” said John Beard, founder of the Port Arthur Community Action Network. His community’s health is being sacrificed to make excessive quantities of plastic for which there is “not enough use,” he added.
The Environmental Justice Foundation (EJF) highlighted the health impacts of “false solutions” like plastic burning for waste-to-energy projects, which will worsen without regulation. John Chweya, head of a Kenyan wastepickers association, said he could not accept a treaty that lacked language on a just transition for workers who are in the “deepest pits of plastic pollution”. He also highlighted the mounting costs of travelling to each new INC.
Despite Pacific Island states contributing just 1.3 per cent of mismanaged plastics globally, Fiji’s Michael noted that they bear the burden of rising production via ocean pollution. “It’s so easy for many to forget what is really at stake for our people. We are already at the front line of climate change. Our communities are having to relocate… and now we have to deal with this plastic crisis.”
Despite the urgency for vulnerable groups, a weak treaty is worse than a delayed treaty, said Salisa Traipipitsiriwat, senior campaigner and Southeast Asia plastics project manager at EJF. She urged people to avoid the trap of blaming ambitious countries for the lack of an agreement so far. “What we need to criticise is the procedure that doesn’t allow these ambitious countries to win,” she said.
The road ahead
The final rushed hours of the meeting left a great deal undecided and unclear. What is known is that the negotiations will revert back to the text developed in Busan, possibly including elements from Geneva, and that there will be another INC, says Harrington – an INC5.3. The date has not yet been set.
Meanwhile, there may be some soul-searching about the road ahead. Clare questions the perception that the talks “failed” because they have not yet delivered an agreement. International treaties take time, and the plastics process has been comparatively fast. But getting a deal quickly is in any case not where the emphasis should be, he believes.
“Pacific Small Island Developing States and Micronesia, we’ve been clear about that from the start. The pressure should not be from the timing, or the perception that the talks may fail. The pressure should be from considering the needs of those who are going to be harmed by plastic.”
This article was originally published on Dialogue Earth under a Creative Commons licence.
