Creating A Circular Economy with Less Plastic Waste - Implications and Gaps in the International Trade of Plastic Waste
Written by Quinn Liu
1. The Amendment of Basel Convention for Plastic Wastes
During the Basel Conference of the Parties in 2019, Governments amended the Basel Convention to include plastic waste in a legally-binding framework. The amendment will make global trade in plastic waste more transparent and better regulated, whilst also ensuring that its management is safer for human health and the environment.
General Obligations
Contaminated and most mixes of plastic waste will require prior consent from receiving countries before they are traded, with the exceptions of certain materials including PE, PP and PET.
Countries at the receiving end of mixed and unsorted plastic waste will have the right to refuse these problematic shipments, in turn compelling source countries to ensure exports of clean, recyclable plastics only.
Exporting countries shall ensure that the plastic wastes in question are taken back, if alternative arrangements cannot be made for waste disposal in an environmentally sound manner.
Scope
The amendment to the Convention is legally binding and has been ratified by 187 countries. Notably, the United States is not a party to the Basel Convention and thus it has not ratified the agreement. Nonetheless, the ruling will still apply to the United States when it tries to trade plastic waste with countries that have signed up to the agreement.
Enforcement
Any party which has reason to believe that another party is acting or has acted in breach of its obligations under the Convention may inform the Secretariat for verification.
Parties with disputes shall seek a settlement through negotiation or any other peaceful means of their own choice. If the parties concerned cannot settle their dispute, it shall be submitted to the International Court of Justice or to arbitration.
Parties can seek liability and compensation for damage resulting from transboundary movements of hazardous waste.
2. Countries’ Policies and Actions on Plastic Waste
At the beginning of 2018, the Chinese government imposed an import ban on 24 types of recyclable materials, including recycled plastics, as part of an environmental reform movement designed to deal with its growing waste problems. China started to refuse buying any recycled plastic scrap that wasn’t 99.5% pure. In the year since the import ban, China’s recyclable plastic imports plummeted by 99 percent as reported by the Chinese Customs, leading to a major global shift in where and how plastic wastes are being processed. Recycling costs surged for developed countries such as US and UK after the Chinese ban.
Following China’s ban, Malaysia became the world's largest importer of plastic scrap. In late 2018, Malaysia announced plans for a complete ban on plastic imports within three years. The country has also planned to eliminate single-use plastic by 2030. In May 2019, Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte ordered his government to send 69 containers of garbage back to Canada and leave them within its territorial waters if it refuses to accept them. A week later, the Environment Minister of Malaysia announced that the country would send back some 3,300 tons of non-recyclable plastic waste to countries such as the US, UK, Canada and Australia.
Following the policy changes in traditional waste importers, there are also various reactions from plastic waste exporters’ side. The UK government is planning to increase the cost of recycling from retailers and producers from an annual average of about £70 million to £500 million-£1 billion. Canada also announced its plan to ban harmful single-use plastics as early as 2021. The European Commission unveiled a Plastics Strategy in January 2018, saying that its drive to make all plastic packaging recyclable or reusable by 2030 could create 200,000 jobs but only if its recycling capacity was multiplied fourfold. The European Union recycles less than 30 percent of its 25 million tonnes of plastic waste each year, and half of that used to be sent to China.
3. Implications for Transitioning to A Circular Economy
The international trade policy changes signal a transition towards a more resource efficient and circular economy, which can occur at various levels along the product value chain such as second-hand goods, end-of-life products, secondary materials or waste, as well as trade in related services. The increased regulations and costs of trade in plastic waste will incentivize countries that traditionally produce and trade plastic wastes to take initiatives in recycling, reusing and recovering plastic waste, leading to a more sustainable transition to circular economy.
The circular economy transition will likely to introduce structural changes to global trade and have impacts on trade flows, including: lowering of the import demand of primary and secondary materials lowering of exports of materials and waste; new trading opportunities for services trade, such as waste management and recycling; incentivizing refurbishment, remanufacturing, reuse, repair, as well as new business models and product service systems; circular procurement by subnational and national governments may provide additional opportunities for international trade.
Demand and interests in innovative and sustainable packaging have been increasing as countries seek ways to tackle plastic wastes, which may drive up trade flows in environmentally sounds technologies and services. For example, in response to the plastic bans worldwide, Starbucks announced that it would phase out single-use straws from its more than 29,800 locations worldwide by 2020. This move drives technology innovation by Starbucks’ global suppliers. Suppliers of paper straws and glass straws have seen increasing international export over the past years.
Major plastic waste exporters, mainly developed countries, are seeking to increase their capacities of reducing and recycling plastic waste. They may invest in waste processing facilities or import waste-recycling technologies and facilities from countries who are more capable of treating plastic waste. There have also been increasing interests and actions in producing and investing in degradable and compostable materials to replace traditional plastics. At the policy level, removing trade barriers in trading environmentally sound technologies could potentially contribute to global value chain and circular economy, thus building stronger protection against plastic pollution.
4. Gaps and Opportunities for Transitioning to A Circular Economy
Interaction Between Environmental and Trade Policies
Exporters of secondary raw materials are concentrated in certain parts of the world, mainly developed countries. However, there is currently no internationally accepted definition of secondary raw materials. It is therefore difficult to distinguish trade in second-hand products from products that are exported for recycling and recovery.
In order to effectively track and manage trade in secondary materials, the classification and inspection of waste should be done in an integrated and consistent way. However, the reference framework for regular customs operations and for inspection of waste systems are structurally different. Customs work with the UN Harmonized Commodity Description and Coding System (HS-system) to identify goods and products, while the environmental inspection uses the codes in the Basel Convention. There is no one-on-one matching between different systems. Potential misalignment in these code systems could make trade of plastic waste inefficient and unclear. We need to increase the coherence of environmental and trade policies and create integrated and internationally accepted systems to manage trade in plastic waste.
The definition and classification of waste, scrap and secondary materials can be different from country to country. The distinction between end-of-life products, non-hazardous waste, and secondary materials may not be the same across different jurisdictions and subject to further scrutiny. Distinguishing trade in waste for material recovery and trade in waste for recycling is also challenging.
Another potential issue is illegal waste trafficking. Illegal and informal recycling activities, especially in the case of informal e-waste processing in developing countries, often involve toxic emissions and dumping of waste acid without any proper treatment or control, which can lead to severe environmental and health concerns. The complexity and interaction of environmental and trade systems make it challenging to identify and regulate illegal waste trafficking.
Re-designing Plastic Value Chain
At the same time, there are opportunities in resigning the plastic value chain to drive a holistic integration of sustainable materials and an effective transition to a circular economy.
At raw materials and production stages, there should be innovative design for re-usable materials and processes. Increasing recyclable material content would lead to less waste in the value chain. Policymakers should also provide economic incentives for the using of secondary materials in order to promote the production of consumer products with lower plastic losses.
As the stage of consumption and using, we have seen rising promotion sustainable consumption and relying lifestyle. Producers and retailers should prioritize waste prevention over recycling as well as provide clean alternatives to consumers. The public sector and governments could also enhance sustainable public procurement to take lead in transitioning to and promoting circular economy.
At the stage of collection, sorting, recycling and waste management, initiatives should be taken to improve the efficiency of waste collection and waste management. Innovative measures and policies should be established to improve end-of-life waste solutions and minimize its impact on environment, society and economy.
With special thanks to the guidance and insights from Ms. Ying Zhang, Programme Management Officer of the Environment and Trade Unit of UN Environment.
Opinions expressed in the article are the author’s own.