Plastic pollution is accelerating at an alarming pace, despite extensive attempts to curb it. Global plastic production exploded from just 2 megatons (Mt) in 1950 to 475 Mt in 2022, and is predicted to surge to 1200 Mt by 2060, according to an August 2025 Lancet study. The resulting damage to human health and economies costs the world more than US$1.5 trillion every year.
“The (health) impacts fall most heavily on vulnerable populations, especially infants and children. They result in huge economic costs to society. It is incumbent on us to act in response,” Professor Philip Landrigan, the Lancet study’s lead author, and a Boston College epidemiologist and pediatrician, told The Guardian.
Against this background, the UN negotiations in Geneva on a global plastic pollution treaty have taken on an unprecedented urgency.
Single-use surge
Half of the approximately 400 million tonnes of plastic produced annually is single-use plastic, such as drink bottles and fast food containers, the United Nations stated in a 2021 report. Moreover, 19 to 23 million tonnes of plastic waste leak every year and contaminate lakes, rivers, and seas.
Much of the plastic industry is linked with the fossil fuel sector, with 97% to 99% of plastics being derived from crude oil and natural gas. This fuels resistance to caps on plastic production, particularly among oil-producing countries, given that the global plastics market was worth US$524.48 billion in 2024 and is expected to grow to US$533.59 billion in 2025 and US$754.23 billion in 2032, according to a July 2025 report published by Fortune Business Insights.
Recycling myth
While recycling is often promoted as a plastic pollution solution, critics comment that this is largely a smokescreen. The February 2024 Center for Climate Integrity report titled The Fraud of Plastic Recycling stated that there are thousands of different types of plastic with unique chemical compositions, and most of these cannot be recycled into new products, while some have no end markets. In reality, only 9% of plastic waste is recycled, with 19% being incinerated, and nearly 50% disposed of in sanitary dumps, according to a 2022 report by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. The remaining 22% is dumped in unregulated garbage sites, burned in open pits, or leaked into the environment.
In the U.S., the recycling rate dropped to just 5-6% in 2021 as opposed to China’s 31% and the EU’s almost 40%.
A treaty to tackle the full lifecycle of plastic
In 2022, the United Nations Environmental Assembly (UNEA) agreed to develop a Global Plastics Treaty, a legally binding instrument to address the full plastic lifecycle, from production and design to disposal, but negotiations have been contentious. At talks in South Korea in 2024, oil-producing countries, including Iran, Saudi Arabia, Russia, and Kuwait, opposed the treaty, arguing it would worsen income inequality and weaken global progress.
See also: No global agreement on plastic pollution signed following opposition from oil producing countries
The current session in Geneva, running from 5 to 14 August, is tasked with breaking the deadlock and finalizing the “Chair’s Text” with Inger Andersen, UNEP’s Executive Director, stressing that the stakes are high.
“Plastic pollution is already in nature, in our oceans and even in our bodies. If we continue on this trajectory, the whole world will be drowning in plastic pollution – with massive consequences for our planetary, economic and human health,” she said, addressing the over 3,700 delegates from 184 countries gathered in Geneva.
