The Or­gan­i­sa­tion of East­ern Caribbean States (OECS) Com­mis­sion says that ne­go­ti­a­tions tak­ing place at the fifth ses­sion of the In­ter­gov­ern­men­tal Ne­go­ti­at­ing Com­mit­tee (INC-5) in Ko­rea will re­sult in a treaty that ef­fec­tive­ly em­pow­ers small is­land de­vel­op­ing states (SIDS) to tack­le the press­ing is­sue of plas­tic pol­lu­tion.

The OECS is be­ing rep­re­sent­ed at the INC-5, which ends on De­cem­ber 1, by Su­san­na Scott, Of­fi­cer in Charge of the Sus­tain­able Ocean Man­age­ment Pro­gramme, and Farzana Yusuf-Leon, Tech­ni­cal Of­fi­cer.

Ac­cord­ing to a state­ment is­sued by the St. Lu­cia-based OECS Com­mis­sion, the team hopes these ne­go­ti­a­tions will con­clude suc­cess­ful­ly, re­sult­ing in a treaty that ef­fec­tive­ly em­pow­ers SIDS to tack­le the press­ing is­sue of plas­tic pol­lu­tion.

Cur­rent­ly, the OECS is ex­e­cut­ing the Re­cy­cle OECS Project. It is fund­ed by the Eu­ro­pean Union un­der the EU-Caribbean part­ner­ship for co­op­er­a­tion in the field of cir­cu­lar econ­o­my and sol­id waste man­age­ment, and im­ple­ment­ed by the OECS Com­mis­sion in col­lab­o­ra­tion with the Agence Française de Développe­ment.

The Com­mis­sion said that plas­tic pol­lu­tion pos­es a sig­nif­i­cant en­vi­ron­men­tal threat to ecosys­tems world­wide, and the Unit­ed Na­tions has recog­nised the ur­gent need to ad­dress this is­sue to en­sure en­vi­ron­men­tal sus­tain­abil­i­ty.

It said that the OECS- com­pris­ing An­tigua and Bar­bu­da, Do­mini­ca, Grena­da, St. Lu­cia, St. Kitts-Nevis, St. Vin­cent and the Grenadines and Montser­rat- has been col­lab­o­rat­ing with part­ners to ad­dress this is­sue.

It said that the INC-5 is ex­pect­ed to cul­mi­nate in a legal­ly bind­ing treaty to con­trol plas­tic pol­lu­tion, in­clud­ing in the ma­rine en­vi­ron­ment.

“Through­out the INC process, which com­menced in mid-2022, Small Is­land De­vel­op­ing States, in­clud­ing mem­ber states of the OECS have called for an am­bi­tious, com­pre­hen­sive, and all-en­com­pass­ing Unit­ed Na­tions treaty on plas­tics that ad­dress­es is­sues re­lat­ed to the whole life­cy­cle of plas­tics”.

Ex­ec­u­tive Di­rec­tor of the Unit­ed Na­tions En­vi­ron­ment Pro­gramme (UN­EP), In­ger An­der­sen, told del­e­gates that No­vem­ber 25, this year, marked 1,000 days since the adop­tion of UN En­vi­ron­ment As­sem­bly Res­o­lu­tion 5/14, which man­dat­ed the UN­EP Ex­ec­u­tive Di­rec­tor to con­vene the INC to de­vel­op an in­ter­na­tion­al, legal­ly bind­ing in­stru­ment on plas­tic pol­lu­tion. The res­o­lu­tion sets a goal for the com­mit­tee to com­plete its work by the end of 2024.

She is urg­ing the del­e­ga­tions from 175 coun­tries to ne­go­ti­ate in good faith but not low­er the bar so the treaty be­comes mean­ing­less.

The OCS Com­mis­sion said sev­er­al coun­tries ex­pressed con­cern about the pos­si­ble in­vo­ca­tion of Rule 38 of the Draft rules of pro­ce­dure for the work of the in­ter­gov­ern­men­tal ne­go­ti­at­ing com­mit­tee to de­vel­op an in­ter­na­tion­al, legal­ly bind­ing in­stru­ment on plas­tic pol­lu­tion, in­clud­ing in the ma­rine en­vi­ron­ment.

“This Rule, while not yet adopt­ed by the Meet­ing, in­di­cates that if all ef­forts to reach con­sen­sus have been ex­haust­ed and no agree­ment has been reached, the de­ci­sion shall, as a last re­sort, be tak­en by a two-thirds ma­jor­i­ty of the rep­re­sen­ta­tives of Mem­bers who are present and vot­ing.  How­ev­er, coun­tries em­pha­sised the im­por­tance of mak­ing all de­ci­sions by con­sen­sus,”  it added.

Samoa, speak­ing on be­half of the 39 SIDS rep­re­sent­ed by the Al­liance of Small Is­land States (AO­SIS),  has ac­knowl­edged the ef­forts in pro­duc­ing the non-pa­pers in­tend­ed to re­flect the broad range of views on the el­e­ments to be ne­go­ti­at­ed un­der the fu­ture in­stru­ment.

How­ev­er, it was high­light­ed that sev­er­al key el­e­ments, spe­cif­ic to SIDS in­ter­ests, were ei­ther miss­ing or un­der­de­vel­oped in the draft text.

SIDS re­it­er­at­ed that the spe­cial cir­cum­stances of their na­tions must be re­flect­ed ac­cu­rate­ly in the fi­nal agree­ment. They fur­ther con­tin­ued to call for clear, legal­ly bind­ing oblig­a­tions for the re­me­di­a­tion of ex­ist­ing plas­tic pol­lu­tion in the ma­rine en­vi­ron­ment, in­clud­ing in ar­eas be­yond na­tion­al ju­ris­dic­tion.

They spoke of the oblig­a­tions on Aban­doned, Lost, or oth­er­wise Dis­card­ed Fish­ing Gear; the in­sti­tu­tions and process­es that al­low the agree­ment to evolve and be­come more am­bi­tious over time be in the agree­ment text; and clear oblig­a­tion for de­vel­oped coun­tries to pro­vide new, ad­di­tion­al, ac­ces­si­ble, suf­fi­cient and pre­dictable fi­nance to de­vel­op­ing coun­tries, par­tic­u­lar­ly SIDS and LD­Cs.

“Through­out the INC, as well as the non-pa­per process, how­ev­er, SIDS have re­it­er­at­ed our calls for sev­er­al key el­e­ments that were ei­ther miss­ing or un­der­de­vel­oped in the non-pa­pers. SIDS are se­vere­ly dis­ad­van­taged by glob­al en­vi­ron­men­tal chal­lenges that we do not cause.

“A mul­ti­lat­er­al ne­go­ti­a­tion process that does not in­cor­po­rate our in­ter­ests adds in­sult to in­jury. We wish to make clear this week: we will not ac­cept a “take it or leave it” text here at INC-5,”  ac­cord­ing to AO­SIS.

CAS­TRIES,  St. Lu­cia, Nov 28, CMC

CMC/ag/or/2024