Every year, the United Nations chooses a host country for World Environment Day celebrations. The 2023 event is hosted by Côte d'Ivoire and supported by the Netherlands to organise the 50th World Environment Day celebration. The year 2023 is critical to ensuring the world comes together to end the scourge of plastic pollution.
The 2023 World Environment Day campaign #BeatPlasticPollution calls for global solutions to combat plastic pollution. The 2023 theme is “Solutions to Plastic Pollution.” The theme focuses on encouraging people to give up on the usage of plastic and identify it as the source of environmental degradation.
Plastic pervades modern life, appearing in everything from packaging to clothes to beauty products. But it is thrown away on a massive scale. Every year, more than 280 million tonnes of short-lived plastic products become waste. Increasing levels of plastic pollution represent a serious global environmental issue that negatively impacts the environmental, social, economic and health dimensions of sustainable development. About 400 million tonnes of plastic waste are produced every year. The projection of the amount of plastic waste entering aquatic ecosystems could be 23 - 37 million tonnes per year by 2040.
The production of plastic is one of the most energy-intensive manufacturing processes in the world. The material is made from fossil fuels such as crude oil, which are transformed via heat and other additives into a polymer. The packaging sector is the largest generator of single-use plastic waste. Approximately 36 per cent of all plastics produced are used in packaging. This includes single-use plastic food and beverage containers, 85 per cent of which end up in landfills or as mismanaged waste.
In 2022, United Nations Member States agreed on a resolution to end plastic pollution. An Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee is developing a legally binding instrument on plastic pollution, with the aim of having it finalised by the end of 2024. It focuses on measures considering the entire life cycle of plastics, from extraction and product design to production to waste management, enabling opportunities to design out waste before it is created as part of a thriving circular economy. This is an opportunity for the international community to stop the contribution of the plastics planetary crisis by establishing a binding framework to protect human rights, including the rights to health and a healthy environment, from plastic pollution.
Countries need to encourage innovation and provide incentives to businesses that do away with unnecessary plastics. Waste management infrastructure must be improved. Governments can also engage in the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee process to forge a legally binding instrument that tackles plastic pollution, including in the marine environment.
It is time to change how we produce, consume, and dispose of the plastic we use.
World Environment Day Poster (1.39 MB)
