The Global Plastics Summit today announced its finalised speaker line-up for the 2023 event. Facilitated by Economist Impact, the summit will take place on October 11th and 12th in Bangkok, Thailand.
The Global Plastics Summit serves as the most significant assembly of stakeholders prior to the third session of the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee (INC-3) which is scheduled to take place in Nairobi between the 13th to the 19th of November. It aims to accelerate the formulation of a robust and ambitious UN plastics treaty by assessing progress and amplifying voices from across the plastics ecosystem, including from communities worst affected by pollution.
The conference agenda includes collaborative plenary sessions and specialised working groups, engaging a cross-section of 500 leading figures in the plastics industry. Participants range from government negotiators to businesses, health experts and scientists, NGOs, waste-pickers, investors, the finance sector, waste recyclers and policy-makers.
The solutions reached at the summit will be combined into a briefing paper and brought into INC-3 as part of the ongoing UN plastics treaty discussions.
Speakers include:
· J. Uduch Sengebau, Senior vice president, Republic of Palau
· Luhut Binsar Pandjaitan, Co-ordinating Minister of Maritime Affairs and Investment, Republic of Indonesia
· Masako Ogawa, Special International Negotiator, Global Environment Bureau, Japan
· Oliver Boachie, Special advisor, Ministry of Environment, Science and Technology, Ghana
· Peter Thomson, UNSG’s Special envoy for Ocean
· Dechen Tsering, regional director, Asia and the Pacific, United Nations Environment Program
· Eddy Mazuaansyah Bin Mohd Ali MuradDeputy Under Secretary, Environmental Management Division, Ministry of Environment and Water, Malaysia
· Gonzalo Guaiquil, Climate change and plastics negotiations co-ordinator, Directorate of Environment, Climate Change and Oceans, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Chile
· Camila Zepeda Director general, Global Affairs, Mexican Ministry of Foreign Affairs, chief climate and biodiversity negotiator, Mexico
· Jonathan Gillibrand, senior advisor, plastic pollution, Office of Environmental Quality, U.S. Department of State
· Yumi Nishikawa, Plastic smart city lead, Asia, WWF
· Betty Osei Bonsu Country manager, Green Africa Youth Organization
· Christina Dixon, Ocean campaign leader, Environmental Investigation Agency
· Anjali Acharya Marine plastics pollution lead, World Bank
· Kabir Arora, National co-ordinator, Alliance of Indian Waste-pickers; Coordinator, Asia-Pacific, International Alliance of Waste-pickers
· Vicky Zong, Head, sustainable packaging, APAC, MARS
· David Azoulay, Director, Environmental Health; managing attorney, Center for International Environmental Law
· Christian Kaufholz, Co-director, Global Plastic Action Partnership, World Economic Forum
A full list of speakers can be found here.
Built around the working groups, the curated agenda also includes:
· Ministerial keynote interview with Luhut Binsar Pandjaitan, Coordinating Minister of Maritime Affairs and Investment, Republic of Indonesia
· State of play: The ‘zero draft’ and evaluating the global plastic treaty negotiations at the halfway mark
· Achieving a lifecycle approach to plastic pollution: modelling different treaty scenarios
· Differing ambition: high and low for a robust treaty
· Strengthening the science-treaty interface
· Spotlight interview with Mitsuyuki Unno, Executive director, The Nippon Foundation
· A just and inclusive transition: maintaining a social lens
· Screening The Economist film: Small Island Developing States and Plastics
· What is mission critical for INC-3 in Nairobi, Kenya: a look at fostering a progressive yet pragmatic treaty
· Implementation: Translating a robust, legally-binding treaty into viable national action plans
· Enabling conditions: Harmonising regulatory standards, monitoring and reporting across markets
See the full agenda here.
Speaking ahead of the summit, Charles Goddard, Editorial director, global initiatives, The Economist Group said, “The summit is a timely and important conference, taking place soon after the just-released zero draft of the UN plastics treaty and a month before negotiations resume in Nairobi, Kenya. For the global multi-stakeholder community, and governments and negotiators, this is a unique opportunity. Many governments as well as those in the wider multi-stakeholder community have confirmed their attendance. I believe there is great benefit in an independent platform to discuss the issues and solutions vital to achieving an ambitious plastics treaty.”
More details about the summit, including the agenda and a link to register, are on the event website.
The Event’s supporters and sponsors are The Nippon Foundation, Back to Blue, Minderoo Foundation, Break Free From Plastics, Common Seas, Coordinating Body on the Seas of East Asia (COBSEA), Environmental Investigation Agency, Global Plastic Action Partnership, Ocean Plastics Leadership Network, Systemiq, Global Plastics Policy Centre (University of Portsmouth).
