Plastic waste is one of the biggest environmental problems of our time: it contaminates seas, floors and air and threatens ecosystems as well as human health. The global community wanted to stop this flood of plastic – but in Geneva the negotiations for an international agreement have now come to an end after three years and six negotiation rounds without agreement. How did the ambitious agreement fail? And what’s next?
Around 460 million tons of plastic are produced worldwide every year. It could be three times as much by 2060. An estimated 27 million tons of microplastics are already driving in the North Atlantic alone. But plastic is not only in the sea, but also in floors, glaciers, air – and even in ourselves. There it threatens our health, damages ecosystems and even contributes to global warming.
“An ecological catastrophe”
Reducing this global flood of plastic was the goal of the initiators of the international UN plastic agreement. But even in the sixth one that has just ended
