South Africa: SA Officials in Paris to Negotiate a Legally Binding Global Plastic Treaty

30 May 2023
Daily Maverick (Johannesburg)
analysis By Julia Evans

The second meeting of the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee on Plastic Pollution kicked off in Paris on Monday.

The journey to the first global legally binding plastic treaty began in February last year when the United Nations Environmental Assembly (Unea) convened for the fifth time in Nairobi, Kenya (Unea 5.2), and a historic resolution was adopted.

A total of 175 nations, including South Africa, committed to developing an international legally binding instrument on plastic pollution, including the marine environment, with the aim of completing negotiations by the end of 2024 to create a global, legally binding plastics treaty. It seeks to address how plastic is produced, recycled, processed, used and collected.

Since then, the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee (INC) on Plastic Pollution (the group mandated to develop this treaty) met once, in Punta del Este, Uruguay last November. This week, the second meeting is taking place in Paris where delegates will spend five days in negotiations to develop a document that provides options on how countries address the full life-cycle of plastics.

"I'll share with you why, as a country, we took that decision to support this important initiative," said Barbara Creecy, Minister of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment (DFFE) last week at a virtual stakeholder meeting ahead of the INC2.

"It relates to the fact that we...

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