By Neil Tangri, 9 August 2025
In Geneva, 178 countries have gathered to finalize a treaty to end plastic pollution, but the negotiations are stalled. A supermajority have clearly indicated their support for an ambitious, effective treaty: one that caps and reduces overall plastic production; phases out chemicals of concern; phases out problematic and unnecessary plastic products; ensures a just transition for waste pickers, Indigenous Peoples, and other affected communities; and mobilizes sufficient public finance to underwrite the transition.
Just a handful of countries are blocking progress, opposing all these important elements. Losing these critical elements would mean an ineffective treaty, unfit for purpose; but keeping them in would mean losing many of the largest producers of plastic polymer. These petrostates simply wouldn’t ratify a meaningful treaty.
Without ratification, the treaty provisions won’t apply to them. But an ambitious plastics treaty without big plastic producers would still be effective.
It is not news that major polluters will stay outside the treaty. The U.S. has always been clear that it will not ratify any treaty that imposes new legal obligations on it (which is, after all, the point of treaties). In fact, the U.S. has a track-record of not ratifying environmental treaties. Any treaty with effective, legally binding controls on plastic would not count the U.S. as a party.
While the U.N. repeatedly insists that any treaty must be universal, that was always a fantasy. In reality, most environmental treaties are not universal. The Basel Convention has 191 Parties (but not the U.S.); the Stockholm Convention 186 (but not the U.S.), the Convention on the Law of the Sea 170 (but not the U.S.). Universal participation is the exception, not the rule.
So, how can a plastics treaty be effective without universal participation? And, in particular, without the participation of major polymer producers such as the United States and Saudi Arabia?
Fortunately, the history of past environmental treaties offers us useful guidance. Most treaty texts are written with the understanding that participation will not be universal, and they contain provisions to deal with the potential for non-Parties to act as treaty loopholes.
One approach is to leverage the power of Party markets. For example, the European Union imposes chemical transparency requirements on companies that sell in its markets. These requirements apply equally to European and non-European firms, resulting in greater transparency on chemicals overall.
In the treaty, similar provisions could be used not only to promote transparency but to phase down usage of chemicals of concern. Rather than employ different chemical formulations for different markets, many companies will opt to use non-hazardous alternatives throughout their supply chain.
Non-party trade provisions are a more muscular tool. These are common to many environmental treaties, including the Basel Convention, CITES, and the Montreal Protocol. These provisions ban or restrict the trade of controlled substances between Parties and non-Parties. While they do not affect trade between non-Parties directly, these provisions are effective in shrinking the markets for these controlled substances.
A border adjustment fee is a variable tariff placed on imports. The EU’s carbon border adjustment mechanism, for example, uses this fee to level the playing field between goods produced inside the EU (which pay a carbon price) and those outside, which do not. This eliminates any incentive for industry to locate their production in more lightly-regulated countries.
While concerns have been raised about how trade provisions such as these would interface with other treaties, the WTO has repeatedly found that non-party trade provisions and border adjustment fees are compliant with WTO, as long as they are non-discriminatory.
The ability to direct finance is another tool to encourage non-Parties to ratify. Any financial resources mobilized by the treaty, whether from public or private sources, will be directed to Parties; non-Parties will miss out on economic opportunities by remaining outside.
While a universal treaty would of course be ideal, it was never realistic. Fortunately, treaties without universal participation have multiple tools to effect their aims even among non-Party states. The use of these tools would increase transparency, reduce production and use of chemicals of concern, and reduce overall polymer production. In short, a treaty without major plastic producers can nevertheless make major strides toward ending plastic pollution.
