UNEP leadership under fire as plastics treaty negotiations get ugly
Things are getting tense in the ongoing plastics treaty negotiations after non-governmental organizations (NGOs) were told, in a message from the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) on 15 May, that many of their representatives will be denied access to the negotiations.
The message, shared with participants less than two weeks before the second round of treaty negotiations are due to start at the UNESCO Headquarters in Paris, cites “space limitations in the venue” and a “high number of registered NGOs” as the reason for restricting participation by civil society to one person per NGO registered to the conference.
The move has sparked strong reactions from NGOs, who argue that such restrictions run counter to the UN Environment Assembly resolution that mandates the negotiations.
Jane Patton from the Center for International Environmental Law (CIEL) stated that the move “flies in the face of the mandate and established best practice by severely curtailing observers’ ability to engage in the process”. The inability of the UNESCO building to accommodate the high number of participants registered for the conference was foreseeable — and the situation therefore preventable — according to Patton.
The exact number of NGOs representatives that will be allowed entry when the negotiation session opens in Paris on 29 May is still unclear. UNEP has previously reported that 1693 of the 2600 delegates registered to the conference represent 703 “stakeholder organisations” — a term used by the UN to denote a wide range of non-governmental actors, such as business and industry, farmers, local authorities, trade unions and scientists, in addition to civil society organisations such as WWF and Greenpeace.
If each stakeholder organisation is granted one “floating badge” to access the UNESCO building, this would mean that about 60 per cent of the registered stakeholder participants will be excluded from the negotiations at any given time.
Certain groups are worried, however, that the UN accreditation system will place them at the back of the queue. Many scientists lack formal affiliation with UN-accredited organisations and have therefore registered through other civil society organisations.
“We now have members cancelling their travels as they cannot defend spending limited funds on standing outside the venue”, the Scientists’ Coalition for an Effective Plastics Treaty, an independent network of scientific and technical experts, wrote earlier this week.
Others are concerned that communities in developing countries and waste pickers will be especially affected by the new access rules.
“This last-minute restriction locks out those who most need to be heard”, Rich Gower from the relief and development agency Tearfund told The Guardian yesterday. “It is vital that negotiators hear from those with first-hand experience of plastic pollution: waste pickers, communities harmed by dumping and burning, and those living near toxic plants”, Gower said.
The row over NGO’s access to the conference rooms takes place against the backdrop of allegations of undue industry influence in the organisation of the negotiation process. A Reuters story published earlier this year revealed that the American Chemistry Council and other US-based lobby groups are mobilizing to prevent countries from adopting treaty measures to cap or reduce plastic production.
John Serrano, a former lobbyist for the US plastics trade group The Vinyl Institute, stated on Twitter that the petrochemical industry has a long history of opposing the adoption of a plastics treaty and that they intend “to flood Paris with delegates at negotiations next month”.
“It’s critical that negotiations include input from stakeholders most affected by plastic pollution. That includes front line communities near chemical manufacturing facilities, waste pickers, and those in developing countries, where markets are being inundated with single-use plastics,” Serrano said.
In April, a large group of NGOs raised their concerns about the manner in which UNEP and the plastics treaty secretariat handle potential conflicts of interest in the negotiation process. In an open letter to the UNEP leadership, the groups criticised the “relative lack of transparency regarding who is advising the work of the UNEP Executive Director and the […] Secretariat, what their interests are, and under what terms of reference they are conducting their advisory work.”
In response, Executive Secretary Mathur-Filipp clarified that “the framing and development of the ongoing negotiations is being done entirely by the INC secretariat in consultation with the Chair of the INC”.
The debate flared up again, however, following the launch of the UNEP report Turning off the tap by Executive Director Inger Andersen on 16 May. The report is “intended to inform negotiators, put some facts on the table, and tell us what the science says”, according to Andersen. It proposes that a “systems change to address the causes of plastic pollution” can be achieved by “accelerating three key shifts — reuse, recycle, and reorient and diversify — and actions to deal with the legacy of plastic pollution”.
The International Pollutants Elimination Network (IPEN), a global network of 600 public interest organisations, has criticised the report on Twitter, claiming that it reads as a “lobby doc” for the plastics and chemical industries.
In a recent Grist story, IPEN advocates argued that “the report focuses too much on the second two “r’s” — reuse and recycle — and neglects the need to stop producing hazardous plastics in the first place”.
Bethanie Carney Almroth, a researcher involved in the negotiation process, said that the “report seems to favour industry friendly ‘solutions’ that are not sustainable and result in release of toxic chemicals”. She also claimed that UNEP “missed the reviewer comments of 30+ scientific experts from our coalition, criticizing the scope and framing of the report”.
In a call on Friday afternoon, UNEP reportedly apologised for the missing the reviewer comments. “Apologies are accepted”, Carney Almroth said. The Scientists’ Coalition “will continue to support UNEP, the INC and the member states delegates with our expertise”.
Nonetheless, as negotiators convene for the second round of negotiations later this month, the conflict between civil society and industry actors is expected to intensify. If it appears that civil society groups are crowded out of the negotiation rooms by an increasingly assertive oil and petrochemical industry, and the UNEP leadership are unable to put allegations of conflict of interest to rest, things may get ugly in Paris.
By Magnus Løvold, the Norwegian Academy of International Law (@magnuslovold)
The process towards a plastics treaty
Following the adoption, on 2 March 2022, of the resolution “End plastic pollution: Towards an international legally binding instrument” in the UN Environment Assembly, UN Member States are negotiating an international legally binding instrument on plastic pollution, including in the marine environment. The negotiations will take place in five sessions and are expected to conclude with the adoption of a new treaty in late 2024. The first negotiation session took place in Punta del Este, Uruguay, on 28 November-2 December 2022. States and stakeholders are currently preparing for the second negotiation session, which will take place in Paris, France, on 29 May-3 June 2023.
