Why talks on treaty against plastic pollution collapsed

A week of tense negotiations to draft a legally binding treaty combating global plastic pollution ended in failure on Sunday night in Busan, South Korea, marking only the latest setback for global environmental diplomacy after disappointing outcomes at Cop29 and the Cop16 biodiversity summit.

- STUTI MISHRA

The talks, which brought together nearly 200 countries under the UN Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee (INC-5), failed to resolve critical issues, including limits on plastic production, regulations on hazardous chemicals, and financial mechanisms to support developing nations.

Countries most at risk from plastic pollution rejected a watereddown proposal in the final hours, forcing negotiators to agree to reconvene next year. “We did not accept a weak treaty here, and we never will,” Juan Carlos Monterrey Gomez, of Panama, said at the plenary, receiving a long round of applause from delegates.

The failure to reach an agreement in Busan adds to a string of recent disappointments in global environmental talks. At Cop29 in Azerbaijan last month, countries managed a last-minute deal for $300bn (£237bn) in climate finance, far short of the $1 trillion target. Similarly, at Cop16 in Colombia in October, negotiations stalled over unresolved gaps in biodiversity funding.

Despite high expectations and hopes for a strong treaty, the Busan talks started to falter early on. Slow progress in meeting rooms, diverging views, and the heavy influence of fossil fuel lobbyists loomed over the week at Busan’s vast Bexco Exhibition Centre. Observers and negotiators were quickly openly discussing the road beyond Busan, as many said the talks were destined for failure.

The draft treaty text, released late on Sunday ahead of the final plenary, was riddled with brackets – a UN shorthand for unresolved provisions. These included a range of options on some of the most critical issues, including binding targets to cut plastic production.

In practical terms, the brackets symbolised a failure to achieve consensus. The ambiguity left those countries worst affected by plastic pollution and campaigners visibly frustrated, as it meant no clear commitments had been made.