Australia has joined the High Ambition Coalition to End Plastic Pollution, signalling the government’s ambition to end plastic pollution around the world by 2040 under a new plastic pollution treaty.

Minister for the Environment and Water Tanya Plibersek announced Australia will join the coalition, co-led by Norway and Rwanda, including the United Kingdom, Germany, France and Canada, ahead of the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee Meeting (INC1) in Uruguay later this year.

The High Ambition Coalition’s overarching goal is to end plastic pollution by 2040 by:

• restraining the consumption and production of plastic to sustainable levels
• enabling a circular economy for plastics in which plastic products are either reused, recycled, or remanufactured when no longer useful or required for their initial purposes
• achieving environmentally sound management and recycling of waste plastic

Plibersek said plastic pollution is a global problem that requires global solutions.

“That’s why we’re delighted to join the High Ambition Coalition and the Global Commitment. We need to work hard and we need to work together. No one nation can solve the problem alone.

“Through the High Ambition Coalition and the Global Commitment, we look forward to strengthening partnerships across the globe to stamp out plastic pollution.”

Australia has also signed the New Plastics Economy Global Commitment.

The Global Commitment, led by the Ellen MacArthur Foundation and the UN Environment Programme, brings together more than 500 signatories including governments and industry, to work towards a common vision for a circular economy for plastics.

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