The framework outlines economic and investment benefits of a trade facilitative approach, proposals for removing unnecessary barriers to trade, and the role of the WTO among others
The International Council of Chemical Associations (ICCA) has developed a new paper entitled “Trade and Economic Framework for Addressing Plastic Pollution”, in which the Council outlines economic and investment benefits of a trade facilitative approach, proposals for removing barriers to trade, and the role of the World Trade Organization (WTO) among others.
“The global chemical and plastic industry recognizes that multilateral trade measures can help play an important role in eliminating plastic pollution,” the paper said, adding that “with the right enabling framework, free and fair trade can be a critical accelerator of plastics circularity to promote economic models that will generate long-term solutions to address plastic pollution.”
The ICCA paper continued by emphasizing the benefits that multilateral trade solutions will create for developing countries, including promoting economic activity and growth, while delivering environmental solutions. It also warned against the impact of trade restrictive approaches, which could limit access to materials and technologies necessary to implement circular economy solutions, negating these benefits and creating potentially WTO inconsistent policy approaches.
The paper includes the following table, which outlines the economic and investment benefits of a trade facilitative approach:
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Economic Model |
Economic and Investment Benefits | Policy needs |
| Waste Collection | Job Creation opportunities (particularly for informal economies):
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| Recycling |
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| Upstream production with recycled content |
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“By identifying unnecessary barriers to trade as well as investment barriers to waste management and recycling, the industry can align with the interests of developing countries to promote investments that generate jobs and sustainable income, while simultaneously preventing waste leakage and plastic pollution,” the paper said.
“Such efforts would result in more concrete outcomes in line with multilateral trade rules and align interests between developing and developed countries on using trade to promote investment, development, and environmental sustainability,” it added.
In summary, the paper warned that barriers to trade can impede effective waste management as part of efforts to eliminate plastic pollution and called for coordinated and concrete outcomes to address barriers to waste management and support a transition to a more circular economy.
“Removing unnecessary barriers to trade will facilitate the movement of hard to recycle plastic waste from countries without sufficient recycling capacity to regional hubs that have the capacity to recycle plastic waste in an environmentally sound manner. This will especially benefit smaller economies and Small Island Developing States (SIDS) who may not have sufficient scale to run such operations economically,” the paper said.
“A lack of common definitions, rules, or other criteria often prevents effective deployment of effective waste management technologies and creates in effect a barrier to trade that can impede efforts to address plastic pollution,” it added.
Aligned with the UN Global Plastics Treaty negotiations, the global chemical and plastics industry would encourage greater engagement on the implementation of the Basel Convention, including with stakeholders, to address emerging elements
As a critical stakeholder, the ICCA called on the WTO to complement efforts to help identify and remove unnecessary trade-related barriers that prevent effective waste management and clean-up and develop a more coordinated and transparent trade regime that addresses plastic pollution.
