S17E4: INC-4 and Plastic Chemicals

Sustainable Asia

We're back partnering again with the Break Free From Plastic movement to feature NGO advocates in Asia. In this episode. we are going to hone in on one of the big open questions at the April 2024 INC4 talks. How should the treaty deal with problematic plastics and chemicals of concern?

The US EPA recently banned certain PFAS chemicals in drinking water. And Switzerland called for an initial list of problematic plastics to be worked out by year end 2024. With short time left to negotiate the plastics treaty there is a forward movement to finally regulate toxic chemicals in plastics. But we want to take a step back and give more background to what are chemicals of concern in plastic for consumers and advocates alike. Then, at the end of this episode, we'll circle back to how these problematic plastics can be regulated both in and out of the treaty.

Guests:

1. Madhuvanthi Rajkumar, Researcher in environment and climate action and solid waste management at Citizen Consumer and Civic Action Group, or CAG, in India. She represents consumer consituency at the Global Plastics Treaty meetings.

2. Jam Lorenzo, Policy development and research head, Ban Toxics in the Philippines.

3. Jorge Emmanuel, Adjunct professor of environmental science and of engineering at Silliman University in the Philippines. He's also an official member of the Philippine Philippine Treaty Delegation

Production credits:

Host: Marcy Trent Long

Producer: Carol Mang

Intro/outro music: Alex Mauboussin

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We have partnered with Break Free From Plastic (BFFP), headquartered in Asia, to produce this series. BFFP has numerous resources on their website about the Global Plastics Treaty:

You can also refer to: GAIA's treaty page and GAIA’s Asia Pacific treaty page

And check out CIEL's paper on UN procedural tools used to block plastic treaty progress.