‘Ghost gear’ is fishing gear which has been abandoned, lost or otherwise discarded at sea and is widely regarded as one of the most harmful forms of plastic marine debris.
This briefing looks at the potential application of three outlined principles. It provides recommendations for how they could be taken beyond simply references in preambular paragraphs and effectively guide both the process of developing a treaty and the enduring implementation and compliance of an instrument truly capable of ending plastic pollution.
In March 2022, at its fifth session, the United Nations Environment Assembly (UNEA) adopted resolution 5/14 titled “End plastic pollution: Towards an international legally binding instrument,” convening an intergovernmental negotiating committee (INC) to develop a new global agreement on plastic pollution. Negotiators must now move swiftly to agree to measures across the full lifecycle of plastic to end plastic pollution.
In this briefing we provide some key considerations for negotiators going into INC-2 and reflections on the Options for Elements paper.
As awareness of the issues brought about by agriplastic use are growing, so too is the search for alternative products or methods.
British farms produce 135,500 tonnes of soil-contaminated agricultural plastic waste each year – roughly equivalent in weight to 900 adult blue whales.