Plastic Podcast Episode 28: The Road to Busan and Beyond - A United Nations Treaty on Plastics

It’s time to talk about a United Nations Treaty on Plastic Pollution. After months of anticipation, this episode focuses on the treaty’s negotiating process, the main actors involved, and the key interests at play. Joined by expert guest Tara Olsen, a researcher from Lund University, the conversation explores the complexities of treaty negotiations, including the differences between signing and ratifying a treaty, the influence of international law, and the possible outcomes of the upcoming final negotiation session. Packed with insights, this episode provides a deep dive into the current state of the global effort to regulate plastic pollution and what might come next.

Episode Guests: Tara Olsen 

Connect with Tara Olsen here. 

More on the Scientist’s Coalition for an Effective Plastics Treaty

Follow the treaty negotiations with CIEL 

Follow the treaty negotiations with  IISD 

More information about the episode and the Plastic Podcast

Episode Transcript and more information on the Pine Forest Media Website.

Follow Pine Forest Media on Instagram @pineforestmedia

Hosted, produced, and edited by Clark Marchese 

Cover art and PFM logo by Laurel Wong. 

Theme music by Tadeo Cabellos

Transcript:

[00:00:10.110] - Clark

Hello, and welcome back to another episode of Plastic Podcast, the show that tells the science and the story of our relationship with plastic. I am your host, Clark Marchese, and today we are finally talking about the United Nations Treaty on Plastic's Pollution. Okay, we did it, everyone. We made it here to the end, a long-awaited episode to dig into the treaty that we've mentioned almost like 30 different weeks now. Here's how we're going to do it. We are not going to discuss individual policy debates or specific examples of how the treaty should regulate plastic. I think we've done that a lot already with different experts in their own episodes. Today, we're going to hear about who are the main actors in the negotiating process, what their respective interests are, and we're going to get a general overview of how a treaty like this comes to be, essentially. It's dense, it's a fair bit technical, but we can get through it together. At the end, I think we'll have a pretty good understanding of this treaty that we've mentioned so many times. Now, there have been There are thus far, four large-scale UN negotiating conferences on this treaty, and the fifth one is just around the corner.

[00:01:21.240] - Clark

It starts on November 25th. For reference, you will hear the letters INC a lot throughout the episode, which stand for Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee. We'll just say INC 3, INC 4, for example, to refer to each of these meetings. We are going to hear about how far the treaty has been developed over the previous four meetings, and now where we stand going into the fifth and final one. I say final because this is meant to be the last one. From the beginning, they planned to have only five. So it's possible we are about to have a treaty very soon. Will that actually happen? We literally can do nothing else but wait and see. More on that later. We're also going to talk about enforceability and what accountability sustainability will look like once we do have a treaty. Our guest today will help us understand a lot of things, so I want to hand her the microphone very soon. Tara Olsenis speaking with us today. Tara is a researcher at Lund University, and she has been working to map these treaty negotiations. Her research unit is tracking who is involved, what their positions are on what issues, and what the treaty is set to include.

[00:02:20.030] - Clark

She is extremely knowledgeable and has attended some of these previous negotiating conferences, and she has a lot to teach us. Before she does, though, there's a couple of things that might be helpful to understand and to mention. Let's do bullet points. First, there is a difference between signing a treaty and ratifying a treaty. It's a two-step process. To sign it means that you agree with what's inside of it, you support it, and you open yourself up to pressure and even embarrassment from the international community if you fail to uphold what it says. To ratify it means to actually take it up into national law. Second, sovereignty. For the purpose of this conversation, it's important to remember that no nation state can force another to do something it doesn't want to do. Treaty signers to be willing participants. Third, the Paris Agreement. We will be referencing the Paris Agreement a couple of times as a model for this treaty. The Paris Agreement itself is a treaty, but instead of plastics, it was addressing climate change. It was signed in 2015 to establish emissions reductions targets and a plan to meet them. We will relate these two treaties to each other a couple of different ways as we go along.

[00:03:21.650] - Clark

I think those are my bullet points for the top of the show. Now it's time to welcome Tara Olsento the podcast and buckle up I will see you on the other side. All right, so we are recording. Welcome, Tara Olsen to the show. The first question I have for you is if you could just introduce yourself and tell us a bit about your work.

[00:03:52.980] - Tara Olsen 

Yeah. Hi, I'm Tara Olsen. Last summer, I graduated from a Master's in Environmental Law. Before that, I did a bachelor's in politics, psychology, and economics. Since last September, I've been working as a research assistant at Lynch University within the Political Science Department, and they hired me to work on mapping the position of actors involved in the plastic trading negotiations. There's a team of us there with some colleagues at Copenhagen University that have been analyzing the position of states and how we've done that is ahead of the second and third round of the plastic trading negotiation. States were asked to submit written reports or documents on their positions, what objectives they want to see in the treaty, what types of measures, and where along the value chain they would put these measures. We've analyzed that and made a compilation of it. I've also been involved with the Scientist Coalition for an Effective Plastics Treaty and working with them to bring independent peer-reviewed science to the table of the negotiations.

[00:04:58.940] - Clark

Okay, you must be a very, very busy person. Now, I guess this report that you're putting together, I'm wondering who's the audience for that?

[00:05:06.940] - Tara Olsen 

From an academic perspective, it's been very interesting to look at it, to see the types of measures that are being proposed, if it's in line with maybe what academia or other actors say is important to include in a treaty. But we also heard from negotiators from states that it could be very interesting to actually get a big picture because these are very intensive two use for them, and they're constantly working on their positions with their allies or states that they work with, and they might not have the time to look at what is everybody else proposing and looking at. We've gotten feedback that says, It's very nice to get this overall big picture of, Okay, this is everything that's being proposed and who is proposing it. Because also once it goes into the document, then it doesn't say who proposed what. Everything is on an equal playing field. To get an overview of who said what, where, can be very beneficial because you might have similar-minded countries that you didn't know were proposing similar measures that you could work together with and form bigger coalitions. There's multiple different perspectives from this work.

[00:06:17.900] - Clark

Okay, that sounds like an incredibly valuable resource. In case we have jumped ahead of ourselves, people who've been listening to the show for a while will have heard of this treaty on nearly every episode. But in case someone is just jumping into the series now, can you give us a brief, I guess, elevator pitch or introduction to what this treaty is?

[00:06:35.440] - Tara Olsen 

Yeah. In March 2022, the United Nations Environmental Assembly met for its fifth session, and within there, they decided to adopt the mandate that would give UN member states the task to start a negotiation towards an internationally legally binding instrument on plastic pollution, hence some a treaty. That's within Resolution 514. Within that, it mentions that we want an instrument on plastic pollution, including in the marine environment. That should have both binding and voluntary approaches based on a comprehensive approach that addresses the full life cycle of plastics. That took many years to get to this point, to get this agreement. They decided that it should be done by the end of 2024. They decided to have five sessions, negotiating rounds, so to speak. We're now entering the final stage Which is of that, the final rounds at the end of 2024, supposedly. We have to see how it goes, but they could always decide to renegotiate the mandate and say, Okay, we need more time. But there is a lot of want to finish it by 2024, but it's always open.

[00:07:48.510] - Clark

Okay, so we will discuss what we can expect from this fifth session, which is taking place in Busan, South Korea, starting on November 25th, and whether or not it might, in fact, be the last one. But let's start with what has happened already at the first meetings. The last one was in Ottawa, Canada, in April. Have you been to any of these meetings? And if so, can you tell us what it's like to be at one of them?

[00:08:10.870] - Tara Olsen 

Yeah, so I've attended the third and the fourth rounds, the third one being in Nairobi, Kenya, and the fourth one, like you said, in Ottawa, Canada. I think I'm also going into it from an academic background from a observer member, while I'm there. I'm not in a state's delegation. But from From an outsider's perspective, almost going in. It starts off almost, I guess, chaotic, but organized chaos. It's very intense. It's a full week of meetings. Almost every country in the world is represented, and you're all here for the same goal of discussing plastics and how to have an effective plastics treaty. There's a lot of work going on nonstop. There's always something that you could be doing. But it also feels very empowering to be there and to see so many people working on this because there's many NGOs and actors or my colleagues from academics that have been involved in this for many, many years. To see it all come together, finally, and have all these people working on it is very nice to see. Yeah, it's a mixed feeling of emotions, but I think we always come out of it being very tired, needing some time to recuperate.

[00:09:20.000] - Tara Olsen 

But it's an amazing experience. Coming from a law background, it's very interesting for me to see how a treaty is negotiated. I've studied big agreements like the Paris Agreement, to Montreal, CPD, and you hear about how political these negotiations can be, even though it ends up being a legal text. There's a lot of politics that goes into it, and you read that and you're like, Okay, yeah, that makes It's really intense. But once you're there, you really see, okay, which countries are huddled up together at the end of the room talking to each other and all these dynamics that you can't read about in a paper. It's very enriching as well if you're working in the field to be able to attend it to really understand all these dynamics.

[00:10:01.660] - Clark

Wow, that sounds intense. Are you planning to attend the next one as well?

[00:10:05.890] - Tara Olsen 

Yeah, I'm planning to.

[00:10:07.830] - Clark

Okay, exciting. Well, I want to understand now who the different actors are and the interest represented at these meetings. Now, you mentioned the goal of your report is to map the different interests and different stakeholders. I suppose since it's a UN event, is looking at nations as an entity themselves the best way to understand the different stakeholders, or is there a different way to break it down?

[00:10:28.540] - Tara Olsen 

Yeah. To attend a meeting in person, there's different categories. You have states and nonstate actors is the biggest divide. Within a state dedication, they can bring... I think there's no limit to how many people you can put in your delegation. It's up to the states to choose who they put on it. Usually, it's members of ministries. They could have national experts, but they're also free to put industry actors in there, whatever they choose. You have some delegations that have two or three people, and you have some delegations that are over 30, for for example. That can have a wide range there. Then, secondly, you have non-state actors. That's mainly NGOs. You can have industry representatives. At INC 4, there were almost 200 lobbyists from the fossil fuel and chemicals industry present. You also have scientists, so the Scientist Coalition for an Effective Plastic Treaty. But we go through our own NGOs, who are not a formal entity through the UN. But you have different scientists and many different NGOs and stuff that attend. You also have other UN organs. We have all the representatives from the United Nations Development Program, from the High Commission of Human Rights.

[00:11:40.260] - Tara Olsen 

World Bank was present in Canada. You also have the FAO, the Food and Agriculture Organization. Because it links us with the Marine environment, so the International Maritime Organization has a stake in this as well or gives their advice and knowledge on certain topics. The World Health Organization, because there's also health issues with plastics. They were present at INC 4 to talk about blanket bans for the healthcare industry, if that is really needed or not. Then you also have the World Trade Organization that has an interest because there's been discussions around trade restrictions and how that ties in. There's many actors.

[00:12:18.760] - Clark

Okay, so I have a number of questions. The first one is, as you mentioned that scientists who are there have entered the room through their own respective NGOs. I'm wondering how the people who are advocating for the interests of the fossil fuel industry weasel their way in?

[00:12:32.730] - Tara Olsen 

I think it depends, I guess, which at some companies you can register as an entity through UNEP.

[00:12:42.310] - Clark

Unep being the United Nations Environmental Program.

[00:12:45.610] - Tara Olsen 

If you're an accredited organization, then you can attend to your organization. That could be a company that has stakes in fossil fuels and chemicals. But you could also not. Then you go through somebody else or through state delegations. It can really depend. It's difficult sometimes to fully understand everyone that's present, what all their stakes are. There's no conflict of interest policies, which is something that we've been trying to advocate for because sometimes you could have an industry representative in front of you and you don't know who that person is, what company they're representing, what their interests are. It's not fully transparent in that way in the negotiations. That's something that we are trying to be more aware of.

[00:13:29.780] - Clark

Okay, I feel like conflict of interest policy sounds like a good idea, but who am I? Another thing I was curious about, you mentioned not only do we have all these different actors, but there are also all of these different interest areas or focus areas, be it oceans, be it health, be it fossil fuels, be it carbon emissions. How do you go about fitting all of those topics into one document? Is there some structure to it?

[00:13:56.150] - Tara Olsen 

Yeah. That's one of the things with this treaty is that it is plastic are very complex. I think going into it, the states didn't think that it would get this complex, perhaps because they decided, Okay, two years, we can do this. But then as we go on, we keep finding more things and more links with plastics, with climate change with triple planetary crisis, with human health, with microplastics, with chemicals, with all these different links that somehow need to all be addressed in this treaty in a comprehensive manner. It's very complex.

[00:14:28.230] - Clark

Okay, for listeners and also for myself, triple planetary crisis is a term adopted by the UN to explain the three most pressing interlinked environmental issues we are facing, which are climate change, pollution, and biodiversity loss.

[00:14:40.950] - Tara Olsen 

The treaty at the moment is structured in a way that's in different parts. The first part looks at the objective of the treaty, which principles does it aim to follow, and the scope. The second part is where you have more of the substantive aspects, and that loosely follows a life cycle approach. The first provision is on production of primary plastic polymers, then goes into chemicals and polymers of concern, then goes to product design and labeling criteria, short-lived or single-use plastics designs. Then it goes into non Plastic substitutes, and then waste management provisions, questions on trade to non-party members, then wants to tackle legacy plastics, existing plastic production, all the cleanups that need to happen in the environment, addressing microplastics, extended producer responsibility, just transition for workers and the informal waste sector has been a big part. Transparency, tracking and monitoring.

[00:15:45.690] - Clark

We actually had an episode where we did a full life cycle assessment of plastic, and it sounded like what you just outlined. They just addressed the issues as they come down the pipeline, as it were.

[00:15:55.330] - Tara Olsen 

The big bulk of it is in the second section, which at the moment is very messy because all the different options are still on the table. Then you have a third part of the treaty that's on financing. The financial mechanisms, who's going to pay for what? Do we want public, private financing, a mix, capacity building, technical assistance, knowledge transfers so that states can help each other through this. Then you have the next part on implementing, so having national plans, what does compliance look like, monitoring of progress. There's all these different parts within the treaty to organize it a little bit, but the main bulk of it is in the second part on those substantive aspects.

[00:16:39.250] - Clark

Okay, so throughout the series, we've done episodes discussing a lot of things that you've listed as areas of concern. We're not going to go into specific policy debates and disputes for every one of them, but I'm wondering, in your experience in this space, are there any that stand out as major debates defining the treaty or controversies? Conversely, are there any things that that have already been agreed upon that everyone is on board with?

[00:17:03.600] - Tara Olsen 

Basically, at the moment, is anything completely agreed upon? The answer is, for me, no. Everything is on the table until the final hours in Korea. At the end of INC 4, we have now nearly 4,000 brackets in the text. What that means, if it's in brackets, it means it's not agreed upon. Basically, anything that's not in brackets is words like the and Basically, nothing is agreed upon until everything will be agreed upon at the end. Every substantive provision that I just mentioned has a multitude of options and suboptions that are still on the table and that they need to narrow down in Busan. It goes from usually the very ambitious parts of the option to a less ambitious part and everything in between. There are basically outstanding debates on all the topics. I think for me, the two outstanding ones or the two major ones that need to be discussed in Korea are rules of procedure, which isn't a substantive aspect of the treaty, but a procedural aspect, because there's been debates since INC1 on basically there's rules for how to conduct ourselves and the whole process, the procedural part of the treaty making process.

[00:18:26.630] - Tara Olsen 

One of these rules is that we want to make decisions by consensus. Everybody has to agree because there's this principle of sovereignty in international law where every state has sovereignty. In international law, they have to give their consent to be bound to anything.

[00:18:41.500] - Clark

Yeah. Maybe a brief aside for how an uptake of a treaty actually works in our system of international law. It works in a way where in no country it can be forced to do something it doesn't want to do or to sign a treaty. So not every country is a signatory to every treaty. And if you're not a signatory, it doesn't apply to you in a sense. Now, when a treaty gets negotiated on in the first place, it usually means that it's an issue of great enough significance where everyone agrees in a general sense that it should be addressed, though they might have different opinions on how. But nevertheless, everyone wants to have a seat at the table in the decision-making room.

[00:19:15.930] - Tara Olsen 

Usually, that's the starting point. But there is usually written in the text that if you can't agree to consensus, then you vote with a two-thirds majority. And since INC1, you've had countries like Saudi Arabia, India, Brazil, and Iran saying, Well, we don't agree to this, and we only want consensus decision making. At INC 4, India reiterated that again. And it's been an issue where at INC 2, they lost half the week discussing this matter and not being able to agree on it. Then they tabled it. At INC 3, it loomed over us, but they, again, didn't really talk about it. Then at INC 4, again, left it off the table to talk substantive matters because that also needs to be discussed. But now we're getting to the point where we're arriving at INC 5, where we're supposed to decide at the end of the week, and we don't know whether it's going to be consensus or whether it's two-thirds majority.

[00:20:13.680] - Clark

Quickly, again, INC just means Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee, and we'll see it use this acronym to reference each of these meetings in relation to the Plastics Treaty.

[00:20:22.950] - Tara Olsen 

That changes a lot with the content of it, because if it's consensus decision-making, then everybody needs agree. You water down the text to a point where everybody will vote yes. If it's a two-thirds majority, then you could end up with a more ambitious treaty. If it's only a minority of countries that disagree, but it slightly undermines a principle of sovereignty, which is a basic principle in international law. It's a very difficult conversation to have and to agree on. We're this impasse where we don't really know what's going to happen. If you remove the option of a two-thirds majority vote, then states that are less ambitious can just put their foot down and say, We don't agree. There's no incentive to negotiate, almost. If you keep that in there and you have that option, then it incentivises, for example, India, to compromise and meet somewhere in the middle. They can't just put their foot down because if they're in the minority, then they're not just not listened to and they're out of the discussion. And they want to have some influence, so they will have to compromise and discuss. We don't really know what's going to happen in Bussan, how much time we're going to have to spend on this versus everything else that we need to talk about.

[00:21:44.260] - Tara Olsen 

So that's Something that's something that's looming over all of our heads, and we don't know how it's going to happen.

[00:21:50.900] - Clark

Okay, so that's the first one. You mentioned there were two major outstanding debates. What's the second one?

[00:21:56.740] - Tara Olsen 

The second one is on upstream measures.

[00:21:59.870] - Clark

Upstream Downstream, meaning everything that happens before a plastic product is brought to the market. Downstream, meaning everything that happens once it's out there in the world.

[00:22:07.180] - Tara Olsen 

Because this has also been a contentious issue where some states say, Well, for us, upstream measures are not under the scope of this treaty, even though the resolution, 514, that we spoke about at the beginning, says full life cycle of plastics, which should include upstream measures, so production and extraction of raw materials. But some states now say, The problem is that in the resolution, that was not defined. What is full life cycle of plastics? And it's still not defined. So this definition, now they're saying, Well, actually, it's full life cycle of plastic waste, or a full life cycle begins with product design. But the problem is, I don't know if one of the other episodes talked about production and how it's increasing. If you're going to turn off the tap and talk about plastic pollution, you have to talk production.

[00:22:56.140] - Clark

Yes. Listeners of the show will have heard many times, be it the extraction of fossil fuels, CO₂ emissions, climate change, or the air pollution that results in health catastrophes like Cancer Alley.

[00:23:07.160] - Tara Olsen 

This is a very highly debated topic because some countries have a lot of stakes in production. That's another topic that from the perspective of academia and wanting to have a high ambitious treaty, something that should be included, but that some countries don't want included. It's, at the moment, a minority of countries that don't want it included. From our numbers, we have roughly 117 countries that say that they are in favor of having production-reduction versus 16 countries being fully against having a blanket statement of, We don't want this provision. Here, again, the discussion of consensus versus two-thirds plays a big role because if it was Two-thirds, then you could probably end up having upstream measures in the treaty, versus if it has to be consensus decision-making, then it will have to meet somewhere in the middle where it's more vague at the best option. For me, these are the two things that I'm looking at. Obviously, every other topic is also an outstanding debate, but from my perspective and the research that I've been doing, these are the two things that I will be keeping a close look on.

[00:24:14.170] - Clark

Okay, so I have a number of follow-up questions again. The first is, how will it be decided whether we go for consensus or two-thirds? Is there some vote or process to make that decision, at least?

[00:24:24.600] - Tara Olsen 

No, it would need to be a consensus decision of whether it's it's two-thirds or consensus.

[00:24:33.700] - Clark

Oh, dear. So everyone has to agree whether everyone has to agree.

[00:24:37.840] - Tara Olsen 

So you're having a discussion on the procedures, and I think needs to be consensus of what do we do. And if they agree on... Because the two-thirds vote is a really last resort step. It's really because of this principle of sovereignty, states don't want to have to use it. It's really if you're at a deadlock and it's 4:00 AM in the morning and you need to get somewhere, then you could propose voting. But they do prefer to use consensus as much as possible.

[00:25:09.910] - Clark

In your opinion, as someone who's been following this closely, what do you think will need to happen in order for this to be, in fact, the last session where a treaty is actually adopted? Also, how likely do you think that those things will happen?

[00:25:23.250] - Tara Olsen 

That's a great question. I think a lot of things need to happen. Well, first, there's many, many provisions to go through and many, many options to put together. I don't know whether seven days is enough to go through everything. The realistic side of me, the optimistic side would be like, Yeah, we can go through everything. We can have a treaty that talks about the full life cycle, and it's a starting point. Then you have COPs every year to keep building and keep working.

[00:25:54.340] - Clark

A COP, C-O-P, stands for conference of parties, which is just essentially more meetings to check on how things are going. For the Paris Agreement, they happen once a year.

[00:26:03.070] - Tara Olsen 

There are so many details that have not yet been discussed. For example, just simple definitions. What is full life cycle? What are chemicals of concern? What do we mean with sustainable production and consumption? All these different aspects that I don't think is feasible to do in seven days. Whether this treaty ends up looking more like a framework treaty, and that means that it's just very vague and open and sets out provisions, but then you will have annexes and protocols with it that will come later to be more specific, might be an option, or the states might surprise me, and they will work very hard in Korea to get a lot of it done I don't know what's going on in their bilaterals between INC 4 and INC 5. But the truth of the matter is there's a lot of work that needs to be done. There's nearly 4,000 brackets that need to be worked through. I found out when you're at these meetings and you... Because there is, again, with sovereignty and with diplomacy, every state is allowed to say if they want to speak, they can speak and give their opinion on something. When you want to narrow down options, in INC 4, they started going line by line.

[00:27:17.330] - Tara Olsen 

The state reads out what they think the wording should be for this text. Then the next state can go and the next state. You can have 170 states, one by one, reading out what their version of this provision should read like and say, We agree with the word shall. Then somebody else will say, No, it should be should. That's a very lengthy process to make sure that we uphold the right of every country to be able to participate and have their voices heard. It just takes a lot of time. Whether INC5 is enough time for all of that to happen in a diplomatic way where everybody gets to not be undermined and everybody can speak at their own time is very difficult. If they really want to work and make it happen, they can make it happen, I think. But it depends the extent to which they want to do it or if they're okay with having more meetings in 2025 or if their hard line is, No, we want to have it done by 2024 because they don't want to renegotiate the initial mandates.

[00:28:25.320] - Clark

My next question is, if in fact, we end up deciding to pass with two-thirds majority, you said that we might end up with a watered-down version from the original. I'm wondering, does that version exist? Has it already been written up as almost a backup of sorts?

[00:28:40.750] - Tara Olsen 

No. For example, the provision on... The first provision on primary plastic polymers, they just have maybe three or four different options. So option one is no provision. Option two is we shall reduce production and have a global target that states need to implement nationally. So a binding target. And then option three can say national targets. And then option four maybe says voluntary measures. I'm not reading this out, so it might not be accurate, but just to give an example. If you end up If they end up agreeing on two-thirds majority or consensus at the beginning of the week, then that takes... With the options that are in the text, which ones can we negotiate and all agree, Okay, we'll take option three as our point now Can everybody agree on this wording and change things here and there?

[00:29:34.820] - Clark

Okay. Then I want to ask this question because I keep hearing that this treaty, once it's adopted, will be binding. I'm wondering what mechanisms of enforcement are there? Do you feel confident in them? Are they also being negotiated? Because it seems like some countries are concerned with the issue of sovereignty. I'm wondering, can you speak to the tension there?

[00:29:55.200] - Tara Olsen 

Yeah. Compliance and enforceability is a very It's a very difficult question in international law, and then even more in environmental international law. I think, because, for example, with the Paris Agreement, you have an obligation of conduct but not of result. What that means is the treaty as a whole is binding. And when it came into a forest or it took them into a forest, states took it and their national laws ratified it. So it's in their national laws. And at a national level, it could be binding. So you have now a lot of cases with climate where states have been held responsible, for example, in Netherlands, for not doing enough in line with the Paris Agreement. So there they have enforceability in binding this because they put it in national laws and that national law is binding to them. Every country is slightly different with how they ratify international laws and then whether individuals, companies, NGOs have standing in these national regional courts to bring that there to hold states or companies accountable for not doing enough for Paris. You can imagine something similar here.

[00:31:04.680] - Clark

Yeah, and it's true. I think a lot of cases in Europe, in Portugal, in France, in Switzerland, there have been a handful of countries where citizens or NGOs have actually brought lawsuits against their national governments, accusing their nations of failing to adequately uphold different legal texts that support environmental issues. In Switzerland, actually, this year, a group of women, about 2,000 women, took their government to the European Court of Human Rights over climate inaction, and they won. And the court stated in its decision that the Swiss government has failed to meet its own nationally established climate targets. Recently, also in the United States, there was a group of high school students in Montana that sued their government for failing to consider climate change in a proposed deal with a fossil fuel company, and they won as well. They were referencing the Montana Constitution, not a treaty, but this treaty will just be one more document that grassroots organizations can reference when holding their governments accountable, assuming it is taken up into the national laws. This will be the first one that addresses plastic in such a specific way.

[00:32:04.030] - Tara Olsen 

So within the Paris Agreement as a whole, within it, you have the money binding provisions are provisions that states have to submit and receive nationally-determined contributions, every so often.

[00:32:16.950] - Clark

Right. So NDCs, meaning nationally-determined contributions. When we have this many countries with this many regions, GDPs, industries, etc, it doesn't really make sense to impose the exact same expectations on all of them. Each is tasked with asking themselves what upholding the treaty in good faith will look like in their contexts and to commit to getting that done.

[00:32:37.620] - Tara Olsen 

And so they have to submit this document that they have to do, but they don't have to necessarily meet everything that they put in there. There's just a principle of non-regression. If it means that in your first report, you said, We're going to reduce CO₂ emissions from the transport industry by X amount in their next report, you can't lower that ambition. If Which you should be increasing your ambition every time that you submit something. At the moment, within the Basics Treaty, in the fourth section, you have a part of compliance that says there's an option to set up a committee which would be expert-based and facilitates in nature. That means give advice to states and it should be transparent, not unversional, and not punitive. So it's very weak. But I think there's other things all around the treaty that makes it that it could be more enforceable. For example, the ICJ, the International Court of Justice, is going to have this first case from Rana Ratu with climate change. What are the obligations for states when it comes to climate change, taking into account the Paris Agreement, et cetera. If this case makes a good understanding of what the legal consequences are for states, then it could be an indication of other aspects, because plastics and climate are related.

[00:33:57.970] - Tara Olsen 

You could envision court cases linking plastics and climate and the need for states to do more with plastics. But within the treaty itself, again, it will depend, I think, with consensus versus two-thirds maternity, because you can have binding global targets, you can have voluntary targets, you can have national targets, you can have no targets at all, just voluntary measures. But the compliance part of it always ends up being non-punitive. I think more often the case than not, that it's just, Here are some recommendations from our committee, and this is things you should implement. But then the state has this question to say, We've done everything that we could. We don't have the capacity to do more at the moment.

[00:34:45.510] - Clark

Okay. Then just to check my understanding, the treaty can be used by some entity to take a case to the ICJ. Would that be possibly to, I guess, increase accountability if one state is really neglecting what it is that they've agreed to?

[00:34:59.250] - Tara Olsen 

Yeah. If parties. So if the states have both recognized the ICJ as an authoritative court, which not all states have done, then yes, you could start proceedings. But usually, you also try to start with national courts. You exhaust national possibilities. If they still don't agree with the court ruling, then you can go higher and higher. But in theory, I think it's a we're going to see in the future to see court cases if this treaty goes through to hold states accountable or companies accountable.

[00:35:37.830] - Clark

Okay. I don't want anyone to get discouraged by what might seem like a weak framework of enforceability at a high level because As you said, you exhaust all of the national possibilities first. I know some populations have an easier time than others holding their governments accountable, but a large portion of the power to oversee enforcement lies in the hands of the people, which, as I said, is not what you expect with such a high-level international negotiation, but it is something that we have to keep in mind, and I think it should be empowering because this treaty, after all, is a gift to us. It's a gift to our planet, a gift to our future generation. So once we have it, we must use it. I want to ask you now, do you feel hopeful for this treaty? Do you think that if it's agreed upon by consensus and countries uphold it, do you think the strength of the text itself might actually solve our problems?

[00:36:25.190] - Tara Olsen 

I think it would be a great start already having an international a treaty discussing this. I mean, if you look back, again, I'm going to always link it back with climate and that example as a regime because it's a trickle-down effect. If you have a treaty that needs to be implemented, then you start having finance for it. You're showing that you want to innovate in certain industries. There's a whole informal waste sector of waste pickers that will need to be supported through that transition to something else. There's never been so many people working on it in so much light on plastic pollution and what it means and what we need to do to make it better and to have less plastic pollution in the world. I think it will move us in the right direction towards it. It can be a very slow process because I think that everything has a lot of bureaucracy and innovation takes time and having enough funding for it. But I think in the end, it's a one-in-a-lifetime generation opportunity to really deal with plastics because it was a mess that we've put ourselves in some companies or countries more than others, but that we need to all come together and say, Okay, this is something that we want to work on.

[00:37:38.880] - Tara Olsen 

At every INSEED, there's more and more participants and stakeholders and NGOs involved wanting to make change at all levels. I think it's very empowering to see all these people working towards the same goal of wanting to stop plastic pollution for the environment, for human health, for everything that's linked to it. I choose to be a little bit optimistic about it. I can see with Paris, the Paris Agreement and climate change, we still have fossil fuels and CO₂ emissions. It's not an easy thing to work on, but that people are working towards it and want to work towards it. I think it can be the same for plastics as well. There will be a whole different regime shift or outlook on plastics. Before I started working on plastics, I had no idea how toxic they could be, how microplastic leakages or something that I had not heard of. I think also the educational part of it and harming the regular citizen with valuable information on what plastics actually are and how they can be very harmful to the environment and to you is also a very important thing that I think has come out of this treaty is that more people are talking about that, and I think that will keep growing with time.

[00:38:50.420] - Tara Olsen 

I think, yeah, I am hopeful.

[00:38:53.970] - Clark

Okay, that actually does make me feel so much better to hear you say that. I also think that you're right. I think if we look at the Paris Agreement, again, as a parallel, even just the last thing you said about education and awareness, the amount of people talking about climate change and the baseline knowledge that the average person has about it has just increased so much. There's actual power behind that. We are wrapping We're going to be closing up with a couple of final questions, and the first of which is simply, is there anything... I mean, obviously, there's 4,000 brackets left undecided, so we could spend at least 4,000 hours talking about them, but is there anything that we did not mention today that you think we can't finish this conversation without saying I think, so again, coming from a legal policy background, non-natural sciences, I think this treaty and this work that I've done has really opened my eyes to the need of interdisciplinarity and working with people from many different spheres, and especially in this case, sciences, natural sciences, and putting the science to policy, that whole sphere of it.

[00:39:56.270] - Tara Olsen 

There's been a lot of misinformation spread around and a lot of money being spent from some actors to keep status quo and business usual and to promote narratives that we can reach 100% recycling and plastics is not bad for you. I think it's really important to ground ourselves in science and an independent peer-reviewed science. This is why I joined the Scientist Coalition for an Effective Plastic Treaty, because I think it's so important to, in a way, democratize that knowledge and bring it to the negotiators and to the public with no conflict of interest or interest behind it. We just want to share what the current state of knowledge is on the topic with no agenda behind it. I think that's one aspect that I didn't touch much upon because I'm not a natural scientist, but that as policy and lawmakers, you need to also have that responsibility to get your knowledge from independent sources. I think that's an important thing that's come out from these negotiations for me.

[00:41:02.240] - Clark

I cannot think of a better final note and this Intersectional Science podcast series on. My last question is, for people who are interested in following the evolution of this treaty, where can they do that?

[00:41:12.740] - Tara Olsen 

To follow up this for the treaty, there's a lot of different sources. There's the IISD, which gives updates as the negotiation weeks go. They give daily updates for what happened on the ground and updates at the end of the week, summarizing everything, and they do it with also the climate regime and so forth. For me, they're a very reliable independent source. If you want more of the legal policy updates, then the Center for International Environmental Law, SEAL, on LinkedIn and their website, it's the Center for International Environmental Law, so they do everything with the legal aspects of it. They have a great team working on the Plastics Treaty. Then for the more scientific and science to policy, then I would advertise the Scientist Coalition for an Effective Plastics Treaty. There's a LinkedIn page and a website where you can find all the policy briefs and fact sheets that members of the coalition have put together. There's over 300 members from 50 different countries. You have a wide range of scientists working on each output. But I think there's just so many sources, but these are the ones that I focus on.

[00:42:29.690] - Clark

Okay. Well, I'll make sure to include links to everything that you just mentioned in the episode description so people can find them easily there. This is the part where I say thank you so much for taking the time to talk to me today and for coming on the show. I want to thank you so much for teaching us about this treaty that we've heard so much about, and now we have such a better in-depth understanding of it. I also want to thank you for your research and your advocacy in this space.

[00:42:51.050] - Tara Olsen 

Thank you. Thank you for having me on.

[00:43:05.000] - Clark

All right, everyone, that is the end. I will put some further reading in the show notes about the treaty, and I will make a follow-up episode once the treaty is actually finalized, whatever that happens to be. But for now, this is the last episode of Plastic Podcast. I want to thank all of you for listening, and I hope you enjoyed it. I hope you learned something from it. I enjoyed making it. I learned a lot from it. If you think environmental journalism like this is important, please share it around, because whether we're talking about art or protest or coral reefs or turtles, human health, and international decision making, this podcast is now readily accessible on the internet forever, and there's a lot of information inside. If you enjoyed the show, Plastic Podcast is only one of a handful of podcasts made by Pine Forest Media that covers different environmental issues in a similar multidisciplinary science and way. You can search for those. We've got one on the importance of Antarctica called South Pole. We've got one called Something in the Water that talks about drinking water and access issues around the world. We've got a couple more coming out soon.

[00:44:06.120] - Clark

You can search for Pine Forest Media or those two podcasts wherever you stream. I want to give a major final thank you to Tara Olsenfor coming on the show today. A big, big thank you to every single guest, not only for giving their time to the show, but also for giving their lives to an issue and sharing their expertise with anyone who will listen. With that, signing off. This has been Plastic Podcast. You've been listening to Plastic Podcast. You can find more information about this week's guests and links to their work in the episode description. Cover art for the show was done by Laurel Wong and the music you're listening to was done by Tadeo Kibajos. I am your host, Clark Markesey, and this episode was produced and engineered by me. If you found it important, please share it with someone you know. Plastic Podcast is part of a larger network of sciencey podcasts called Pineforest Media. You can find more information about us in the episode description on our website at pineforestpods. Com and on social media at pineforestmedia. We've got some exciting sciencey podcast coming out this year, and a five-star rating across platforms is one of the best things you can do to help the entire network to grow.

[00:45:17.010] - Clark

All right, that's all I have for you today. Thank you so much for listening.