ICCA Position Paper on Plastics and Trade

ICCA and our members are committed to working on global solutions that will address plastic pollution and reduce plastics leakage into our environment. In addition to substantial work on the wide range of initiatives including the UN ILBI negotiations, as an organization, we are looking at all tools that can support real progress including trade. We feel Trade Policy can play an important role by facilitating progress in leveraging waste as feedstock to support additional economic activity and technology innovation.

Progressive trade policy would help 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.

Aligning the disparate efforts within the trade space, we are focused on promoting a framework to that builds on countries existing commitments to trade facilitation to provide specific solutions to such environmental issues while also supporting economic growth and development. This model promotes a comprehensive and coordinated approach among these organizations that would result in concrete outcomes that have real economic and environmental benefits, especially to countries who fear that trade and investment restrictions may cause loss of income, jobs, and access to environmental materials and technologies.

The ICCA is pleased to provide such a model in the attached paper which builds upon our previous position papers on Trade and Environmental Sustainability and WTO Modernization. With the right enabling framework, trade can be a critical accelerator of plastics circularity to promote economic models that will generate long-term solutions to address plastic pollution. To learn more about the benefits of such a framework and ideas of such solutions, we invite you to read more in our paper [below]. And to engage with us as ICCA to align trade discussions for a constructive future that builds sustainable economic models and delivers environmental solutions.