Action Against Plastics threatening life in our oceans accelerates as plastic pollution proliferates

Author: Michael Stanley-Jones, Sustainability and Capacity Building Advisor -CRF Italy

The world’s oceans suffer from staggering loads of plastic discharged into the our planet’s waterways each year. Since the mid-20th century, the production of plastic has grown exponentially worldwide – from 1.5 million tonnes in 1950 to 390.7 million tonnes in 2021.[1] With this increase in production has come exponential growth in the amount of plastic waste. Today, we produce about 400 million tonnes of plastic waste every year.[2] Nearly 11 million tonnes of plastic end up in the ocean annually.[3]

Plastic pollution poses an existential threat to marine ecosystems. Researchers have documented up to 580,000 pieces of plastic per km2 in the ocean.[4] Small fish mistake plastic particles for food (zooplankton, fish eggs) and unwittingly ingest them. The fish in turn are eaten by seabirds. Eighty of 135 (59%) seabird species with studies between 1962 and 2012 were found to have ingested plastic, and, of these, on average 29% of individuals had plastic in their gut.[5] The mass and abundance of drifting plastic items in the Austrian Danube were found in 2015 to be higher than those of larval fish.[6]

Of the plastic which ends up in the ocean, a significant portion is transported to the seas by rivers.[7] The plastic input of the River Danube into the Black Sea is estimated to be 4.2 tonnes per day. The Slovak Academy of Sciences estimates between 530 to 1,550 tonnes of plastic waste are discharged by the Danube into the Black Sea annually.[8]

Of the 6.3bn tonnes of plastic waste produced globally since the 1950s only 9% has been recycled and another 12% incinerated.[9] Less than a third of plastic waste in Europe is recycled with half of the plastic collected for recycling being exported to be treated in countries outside the EU.[10]

Trends among companies voluntarily committed to reducing plastic use and expanding the use of recycled plastic in their packaging have been unpromising. Key reduction and recycling targets set in 2018 for achievement by 2025 under the New Plastics Global Economy Commitment are expected to be missed. For example, out of six sectors – Apparel, Beverages, Cosmetics, Food, Household and Personal Care, and Retail – only two showed modest decreases in virgin plastic packaging use, while four showed increases of up to 6% between 2020 and 2021.[11]

On current trends, the amount of plastic waste entering aquatic ecosystems could nearly triple from 9-14 million tonnes per year in 2016 to a projected 23-37 million tonnes per year by 2040.[12]

The rapidly increasing levels of plastic pollution represent a serious global environmental issue that negatively impacts the environmental, social, economic and health dimensions of sustainable development.[13]

In 2016, the European Commission declared that “Marine litter is a major threat to our oceans“ and called for a coherent cross sectoral, rules-based international approach “to ensure that seas are safe, secure, clean and sustainably managed”.[14] A rules-based approach is slowly taken form globally.

In February 2022, governments meeting at the United Nations Environment Assembly (UNEA-5.2) adopted a historic resolution to develop an international legally binding instrument on plastic pollution, including in the marine environment, with the ambition to complete the negotiations by end of 2024.[15]

In March 2023, the Global Environment Facility (GEF) drafted a new agreement under the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea on the conservation and sustainable use of marine biodiversity in areas beyond national jurisdiction. The new agreement commits countries to safeguard life on the high seas. The agreement would cover waters like the Black Sea, the Danube River’s receiving sea.

Coordinated efforts to control plastic production, decrease consumption, and promote reuse and recycling at national, regional and international levels will be needed to secure a sustainable future for the planet’s marine environment and threatened species.

As plastic threatening life in our oceans continues to proliferate unchecked, countries around the globe may finally be ready to take coordinated, legally binding action against plastic pollution.

^[1] Statistica, Annual production of plastics worldwide from 1950 to 2021 (in million metric tons) https://www.statista.com/statistics/282732/global-production-of-plastics-since-1950/

^[2] United Nations Environment Programme (n.d). Our Planet is Choking on Plastic, https://www.unep.org/interactives/beat-plastic-pollution/

^[3] United Nations Environment Programme (2022a). From Pollution to Solution. https://www.unep.org/interactives/pollution-to-solution/

^[4] Chris Wilcox, Erik Van Sebille, and Britta Denise Hardesty (2015). Threat of plastic pollution to seabirds is global, pervasive, and increasing. PNAS 112 (38) 11899-11904. University of California, Santa Cruz. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1502108112

^[5] Wilcox et al., op cit.

^[6]Aaron Lechner et al. (2015). The Danube so colourful: A potpourri of plastic litter outnumbers fish larvae in Europe’s second largest river, Environmental Pollution Volume 188. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envpol.2014.02.006

^[7] Between 1.15 and 2.41 million tonnes of plastic waste currently enters the ocean every year from rivers, with over 74% of emissions occurring between May and October.  Lebreton, L., van der Zwet, J., Damsteeg, JW. et al. River plastic emissions to the world’s oceans. Nat Commun 8, 15611 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1038/ncomms15611

^[8] Stanislav Ščepán, Slovak Academy of Sciences (1 November 2017). Quoted in Odborníci chcú riešiť znečistenie Dunaja plastovým odpadom | Aktuality.sk

^[9] R. Geyer et al. Production, use, and fate of all plastics ever made (2017), Science Advances, cited by The Economist (3 March 2018). The known unknowns of plastic pollution. https://www.economist.com/international/2018/03/03/the-known-unknowns-of-plastic-pollution

^[10] European Parliament (2023). Plastic waste and recycling in the EU: facts and figures (europa.eu)

^[11] Ellen Macarthur Foundation and United Nations Environment Programme (2022). Apparel insights: Plastic packaging (ellenmacarthurfoundation.org)

^[12] United Nations Environment Programme (2022a) op cit.

^[13]United Nations Environment Programme (2022b). Intergovernmental negotiating committee (INC) on plastic pollution. https://www.unep.org/about-un-environment/inc-plastic-pollution

^[14]European Commission (2016). International ocean governance: an agenda for the future of our oceans Brussels, Joint Communication to the European Parliament, the Council, the European Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions. 10.11.2016 JOIN(2016) 49 final. https://www.eesc.europa.eu/sites/default/files/resources/docs/join-2016-49_en.pdf

^[15] UNEA Resolution 5/14 entitled “End plastic pollution: Towards an international legally binding instrument” (UNEP/PP/OEWG/1/INF/1: 10 May 2022). UNITED (unep.org)