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Representatives from 175 UN member states, gathered in Nairobi for an Environmental  Assembly meeting last week, voted unanimously in favour of creating a legally binding global treaty to reduce plastic waste. 

The resolution passed by the assembly, entitled End plastic pollution: Towards a legally binding instrument, expresses nations’ resolve to coordinate worldwide plastic pollution reduction efforts. 

The resolution sets a draft treaty completion target of no later than the end of 2024. The final agreement is expected to, among other things: 

• promote national and international efforts to reduce and ultimately eliminate plastic pollution, particularly marine plastic pollution;

• encourage public education and public-private cooperation on plastic pollution reduction; and 

• specify national plastic pollution reduction reporting requirements. 

Positioned as the “‘Paris Agreement’ of plastic pollution”, the resolution states that the agreement should be legally binding, but as with the Paris Agreement, it will likely end up being non-binding due to American political opposition.

Since the US Senate must vote 2/3rds in favour of treaties before they can be ratified by the president, barring an overwhelming near-term Senate takeover by Democrats, or sea change in the attitude of Republicans (who’ve shown little interest in addressing plastic pollution), that high vote threshold will not likely be met. 

Instead, a forthcoming plastics treaty is more likely to be non-binding so that a Democratic presidential administration may sign it as an “executive agreement” rather than a treaty. 

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