4 Shifts Campaign

Weekly Action - 22 November 2024 - UN Plastic Talks

Take action to end plastic pollution as the governments of the world meet in South Korea for the final round of UN Plastics Treaty negotiations.

 

UN plastic negotiations

There have been a flood of global gatherings in recent weeks which Arise members have taken action on: the G20 in Brazil, climate change negotiations in Azerbaijan and biodiversity talks in Colombia.  Next week the last of these, ‘INC5’ the 5th and final round of negotiations for a new global treaty to reduce and end plastic pollution, is taking place in Busan, South Korea.  Plastic pollution is a huge issue around the world.  Plastic waste is having a devastating impact on ecosystems.  In developing countries 2 billion people have no access to proper waste management systems and are left with no choice but to dump, burn or bury plastic waste – none of which are good options, and all of which have huge negative environmental and health impacts.  Much plastic ends up in rivers, and from there into the seas and oceans creating the huge problem of marine plastic.  A friend of Arise, Wayan in Indonesia, reports how the seas around the island where he lives are filled with plastic waste, “For 6 months of the year the sea is clean, but then the current turns and for the rest of the year our seas and beaches are filled with plastic.  If you go in the sea you swim through plastic bags, plastic bottles, wrappers, old toothbrushes, broken toys, drink cartons, old flip flops.  No matter how much we clear the beach, more and more just washes up all the time.”

 

Caring for creation

As Christians we are called to look after and care for God’s amazing creation, it belongs to him, not us, as it says in the Psalms, “In his hands are the depths of the earth, and the mountain peaks belong to him.  The sea is his, for he made it, and his hands formed the dry land” (Psalm 95: 4 – 5).  Our current linear economic model uses polluting methods to extract, consume, and then discard natural resources faster than the planet can replenish them.  We must shift to what experts call a circular economy.  Just as God designed his creation so nothing is wasted in nature but gets broken down and reused in the biosphere, a circular economy would eliminate all pollution, overconsumption and waste (including plastic waste) and push resources back around the economy in a circular fashion, moving us back into balance with creation as God intended.  Arise’s 4 Shifts Campaign calls for a shift to a circular economy as a key part of rewiring of our global economy to be green and fair, so it still creates the jobs and wealth that lift people out of poverty, but does so without relying on fossil fuels and overconsumption which is wrecking our planet. 

 

A global circular economy law

UN plastic negotiations are a good start to reduce the scourge of plastic waste, but they don’t go far enough.  Even if successful they will leave untouched many other areas of waste, pollution and environmental crisis, which the world must urgently address.  The governments of the world must agree an ambitious global treay on plastic waste, but they should also increase their ambition and negotiate a new global circular economy law.  This new global treaty should revise, strengthen and incorporate the existing global agreements on the environment (including the current plastics negotiations) into a single global agreement on the circular economy.  Specifically this law should ban all polluting activity, further human expansion into wild lands, the production of natural resources that takes out more than it puts back in, and all waste (including plastic waste).  It should also prevent invasive species, and invest in conservation, re-wilding and reforestation programmes.  This law should be implemented in every nation.

Will you take action as part of Arise’s 4 Shifts campaign this week and call for a global circular economy law?

 

Take Action

Speak out in advocacy
Contact Steve Reed, the UK’s Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs.    Ask him to take urgent action to:

  • Ensure his negotiators get the best global plastics deal possible that reduces and ends plastic pollution.
  • Go further than this and shift the UK and the world from overconsumption and waste to the circular economy, by urging the government to call for a global circular economy law.  This law should ban polluting activity, further human expansion into wild lands, the production of natural resources that takes out more than it puts back in, and all waste, in order to trigger the shift to a circular economy.  Urge him to also bring in a UK national circular economy law to implement it here in Britain.

Contact him on Twitter at: @SteeveReedMP, on Instagram at: @stevereedlabour, and on Facebook at: Steve Reed MP, or search for him on your favourite social media platform.

Pray
Pray for dramatic progress on tackling plastic pollution around the world.  Pray that the use of non-recyclable plastics will be banned, all plastic waste cleaned up and future plastic waste eliminated.  Pray that a global circular economy law will be brought in to extend this to all forms of pollution and unsustainable production.

Give
Give to Christian organisations like Tearfund, or secular organisations like the World Wildlife Fund, that are doing crucial work helping to provide proper waste management services in developing countries and clearing up plastic pollution on land and in the oceans.

Ethical Consumption
Avoid purchasing plastic as much as possible.  Buy products that don’t use plastic packaging, and use a reusable water bottle rather than buying plastic bottled drinks.

Practical Action
Grow the movement of Christians calling for change by sending this action on to a friend and encouraging them to sign up to receive weekly actions from Arise directly.

 

Find out more

Latest news – Updates on previous campaigns and latest news from the Arise movement.

Join a local Arise group in your church or area – It’s great to take this action as individual Christians, but even better to come together with others to pray, discuss, worship, learn, have fun and take action together.  Contact Arise if you are interested.

Arise Manifesto – Find out more about this week’s action in the Arise Manifesto, Arise’s big picture, researched, Biblical, holistic and practical vision for a better world. 

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