Optimism remains for countries backing 'progressive' plastics treaty

While the last round of the plastics treaty talks stalled without a deal, those who favor a more ambitious agreement say they still see a path for landing a treaty that would put limits on resin production and restrict some products and chemicals.

In recent public statements, diplomats from those countries say they're working behind the scenes to "consolidate" growing support for those ideas that surfaced at the last round of talks, in Busan, South Korea, in December.

"We believe we can consolidate this large group of countries for an effective treaty," said Tormod Cappelen Endresen, Norway's ambassador to U.N. offices in Geneva, Switzerland. "It is something we can build on."

Norway co-leads 70 nations in the so-called High Ambition Coalition. He pointed out that around 100 countries in Busan backed language to phase-out the "most harmful" plastic products and chemicals and over time "reduce production to sustainable levels."

He spoke on a Feb. 27 webinar on treaty developments, as countries prepare for the next round of talks, scheduled for Aug 5-14 at U.N. offices in Geneva.

The U.N. resolution that launched the plastics treaty in 2022 envisioned Busan as the fifth and final round.

But with countries unable to bridge some sizable gaps, they ended Busan with calls to have the treaty's administrative body, the intergovernmental negotiating committee, organize another round of talks that's being called INC 5.2.

One treaty observer on the webinar said Busan, contrary to headlines at the time suggesting the talks collapsed, actually marked a "significant step forward" because a majority of the 170 nations in the talks publicly backed more "progressive" policies.

"It marked what I've called a moment of ascendancy for the progressive majority," said Magnus Løvold, a researcher with the Norwegian Academy of International Law and frequent writer on the treaty.

Still, he said it's not completely clear that the 95 countries that supported a proposal from Mexico around problematic products and chemicals of concern, and the 85 who supported language from Rwanda limiting resin production levels, would bring that across the finish line in a final treaty.

"For me, the biggest question is whether this progressive majority will capitalize on or build upon these achievements and develop an updated and near final treaty text ready for adoption at INC 5.2," Løvold said. "[Busan] leads me to hope, if nothing else, that we will see such an initiative emerging in the coming months."

Diplomats from other countries in the High Ambition Coalition said it will be important for INC 5.2 to have higher-ranking political officials from environment or foreign affairs ministries attend to work out differences.

"At INC 5 in Busan we got a clear understanding of where we stand, so I think it's time to have those maybe difficult decisions and bring in our political decision makers to unlock some of these issues," said Asha Challenger, a diplomat from Antigua and Barbuda's delegation to the United Nations. "There must be space for this political intervention."

Grenada's lead negotiator to the treaty, Safiya Sawney, suggested on a Feb. 26 webinar of small island states involved in the talks that INC 5.2 will need bring in political decision makers.

"We'd like to be able to formulate an approach for high-level decision makers to impact the process … and bring in the political support and the political fuel to deliver an ambitious treaty," she said.

The Norwegian diplomat Endresen said his country planned to have higher-level ministers attend INC 5.2 and urged other countries to both resolve more technical differences ahead of the next round and bring in their own political appointees to help seal the deal.

"We, as Norway, expect to participate at the ministerial level, and encourage your countries also to participate on the political level," he said.

Other observers pointed to key unknowns in the next round, like how President Donald Trump assuming the White House will impact the negotiations.

Joshua Lincoln, a treaty watcher and senior fellow at the Fletcher School of Global Affairs at Tufts University in Boston, noted that the Trump administration issued executive orders immediately after assuming power that removed the U.S. from two other ongoing treaty talks — global deals on pandemic preparedness and taxation standards.

But the White House has yet to issue an executive order or act on the plastics treaty, he said.

"I believe the position of the U.S. and its engagement with this [plastics treaty] is not yet known," Lincoln said on the Feb. 27 webinar. "I think we have to be sober and careful in the way in which we describe this and not surrender to hyperbole in either side."

Still, he said a White House executive order on paper and plastic straws on Feb. 10 may point to a change in thinking on plastics policy.

"There has been the paper straws executive order, which gives an indication that all is not well with respect to the focus on plastics," Lincoln said.

If the United States leaves the treaty, he predicted the public announcement of that decision may not come until shortly before the next round of talks.

"I think we will obviously find out, whether it's a couple days before, a week before, the day of and so on, we will have an answer to that question," Lincoln said.

The position of the United States will have a substantial impact on INC 5.2, he said, and when it gets clarified, the future direction of the talks will be clearer, including whether countries who want a more ambitious treaty would strike out on their own into a "treaty of the willing" if there's not enough agreement among the 170-plus nations in the talks.

One U.S. plastics group has urged the Trump administration to stay in the talks.

The American Chemistry Council, in a March 3 statement ahead of Trump's March 4 State of the Union speech, urged the White House to "actively engage" in the plastics treaty negotiations.

Apart from any changes in the U.S. position, other diplomats who favor measures like production limits and phase-outs said public support for those ideas grew in Busan.

Dennis Clare, a negotiator with the Federated States of Micronesia and a member of the High Ambition Coalition, said the treaty talks went from about a half dozen countries speaking publicly in favor of production limits at the fourth session in Canada in April 2024, to 100 signing public declarations in favor in Busan.

"To go from five or six countries making sort of general remarks at INC 4 to over 100 countries agreeing on specific language on that issue at INC 5 is a major step forward," Clare said.

He said similar movement has happened on finance proposals.

A Micronesia-backed measure on financing the treaty's programs went from having eight nations supporting it at INC 2, to 60 at INC 3 and then 120 at INC 5, he said.

"We see major progress on key issues," Clare said. "Looking ahead, there's a ways to go, but substantively we're making progress."

Another webinar participant said finance measures remain a complex but important unresolved issue.

"I believe it is key in order to ensure the participation of countries," said Elena Cima, a lecturer in international environmental law at the University of Geneva, speaking on the Feb. 27 webinar.

"Less developed countries would not participate if financial support and a good and efficient financial mechanism is not in place," she said. "At the same time, it is also a part of the treaty that raises some concerns for developed countries or those countries that should provide the financial support."

She said the current treaty text mentions several possible funding streams, including public and private financing, plastic fees, extended producer responsibility programs and traditional multilateral aid.

Several participants on the webinars argued that significant work remains bridging gaps between countries, including those between oil-producing countries and other nations that nearly scuttled earlier negotiation rounds.

Lincoln said that since the U.N. launched the plastics treaty talks in 2022, it's been "an extraordinarily chaotic and dynamic period in the international system" and he said countries should factor that into their thinking on what the pact could look like.

He said different blocs in the treaty, whether it's the "like-minded group" of oil producing nations, the High Ambition Coalition, or the states that backed the Mexico and Rwanda proposals, need to engage in detailed discussions.

"There's a real need to innovate here and bring together elements that haven't necessarily been brought together in the same way before," Lincoln said. "Only at the end of that, I think, do we know if there's a treaty there."