INTERNATIONAL negotiators made progress today towards drawing up a new treaty to end plastic pollution.

After four rounds of talks, the United Nations Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee on Plastic Pollution began discussing the text of what is supposed to become a global pact. 

Delegates and observers in the Canadian capital Ottawa called it a welcome sign that the talks had shifted from ideas to treaty language.

Most contentious is the idea of limiting how much plastic is manufactured. That remains in the text, despite strong objections from plastic-producing countries and companies and oil and gas exporters. 

Most plastic is made from fossil fuels and chemicals.

As the session ended, the committee agreed to keep working on the treaty before its final meeting takes place later this year in South Korea.

The preparations for that session will focus on how to finance the implementation of the treaty, assess the chemicals of concern in plastic products and look at product design. 

Rwanda’s representative said that the negotiators had ignored the elephant in the room by not addressing plastic production.

International Council of Chemical Associations spokesman Stewart Harris said the industry body’s members want a treaty that focuses on recycling plastic and reuse, sometimes referred to as “circularity.”

Activists from communities affected by plastic manufacturing and pollution travelled to Ottawa as part of the umbrella Break Free From Plastic group to ask negotiators to go and experience the air and water pollution first-hand.

Louisiana and Texas residents who live near petrochemical plants and refineries handed out postcards aimed at the US State Department saying: “Wish you were here.”

Joy Banner, of the St John the Baptist Parish in Louisiana, accused the delegates of being “so captured by corporations.”

Vi Waghiyi from Alaska, representing Arctic indigenous peoples, said: “We come here to be the conscience, to ensure they make the right decision for all people.”