 Okay, well, it's five after so given that and in the interest of starting so we have time for questions and answers at the end I'd like to welcome everyone. Welcome to the what is the 14th annual Douglas M. Johnston lecture, which is also part of the winter 2023 series of ESS environment sustainability and society lectures posted by the College of Sustainability and me law this evening. I'd like to start by acknowledging that Dalhousie is located in Shebuktuk, Halifax, the unceded, unsurrendered territory of the Mi'kmaq and Ilnu people, the original and forever custodians of this land and surrounding waters known as Mi'kmaqi, we are all treaty people. I'd also like to acknowledge the people of African descent that have shared these same lands for over 400 years. Building over 50 strong African Nova Scotian communities in Nova Scotia. So my name is Deborah Ross from the College of Sustainability and I'll give just a few logistical details for the zoom session this evening. For those of you with the bandwidth or the capacity, if you can turn your cameras on that would be great. It helps our speakers feel a greater connection with their audience. At the end of the talk will have time for questions and you may type your questions into the chat or raise your virtual hand if you'd like to ask a question on camera. And I'm so delighted that David Wanderzweig and Sarah Sek are here with us this evening. David is a professor of law in ocean law and governance at the Schulich School of Law at Dalhousie and the director of the Marine and Environmental Law Institute. And Sarah Sek is the associate professor of law and the Keddie Chair in Human Rights at Dalhousie. And she's taking time out of her sabbatical this evening to be with us and she will moderate the question and answers after the talk. So David, over to you. Thanks Deborah. Just a few general introductory words before introducing our speaker. First a few words about Douglas M. Johnson. Douglas Johnson was professor here at Dalhousie from 1972 and 15 years thereafter. After coming from Yale Law School with his doctorate. He laid the foundation really for many of our research and teaching programs that we still have today. In 1974 he found a marine environmental law teaching program called MELP and we're still the only law school in the world I think that offers certificates, special certificates in both marine law and environmental law to JD students for law students. He actually established the doctoral program at Dalhousie Law School. He also undertook leading that research in international law, international environmental law, boundary making law, law of the sea, international fisheries law. And he really laid the foundation laid the seeds for the establishment of our marine environmental law institute, a former university institute established in 2004 at Dalhousie. Douglas Johnson went on his teaching career to finish up the University of Victoria National University of Singapore. His last book is still a classic of international law. It's called a historical foundations of world order, the tower in the arena. And it was actually given a post humus award by American Society of International Law in 2008. And so it still is with us as a classic textbook and it really kind of, if you haven't read it, you should read it. It talks about the need for the rule of law to ensure social justice and environmental justice around the world. Unfortunately, Douglas passed away at the age of 75 in 2006. A second general introductory comment. Maybe we can see the slide of our sponsors. Again, we have the college of sustainability, also mean affairs program of a character institute for policy public policy and governance, all co-sponsoring this lecture so thanks to all of them. And then the final slide. I want to make a special brief tribute to Memorial tribute to mine hard to well, as many of you probably know professor do well, passed away in a very unexpected tragic accident with his bike car accident back in September 2022. My heart was a leading, not only Canadian author but world author, and they're in climate law and environmental law. And he's, his present can never be replaced. So we want to again give a tribute to him tonight and again the lecture is an honor for him as well. With that as a background I do want to introduce our speaker then for tonight, Dr. Marcos Orrara. Marcos is a UN special repertoire on toxics and human rights director the global toxic and human rights project and agile professor at the American University Washington College of Law. His extensive NGO experience. A surprise over 15 years of experience, mostly with NGOs in Washington DC, human rights watch Center for environmental international environmental law environmental law Institute. There's also been an expert consultant to various international organizations and entities, including UNEP, United Nations Environment Program, UN office of the High Commissioner on human rights and the International Union for the conservation of nature. He has served as legal advisor to the Chilean Ministry of Foreign Affairs and various files, environmental files, sustainable development files. And I was really impressed that was even involved in climate negotiations on behalf of the Independent Association of Latin American and Caribbean states. So broad experience. His educational background includes master's degrees in law. A doctor on master's degrees in law from American University Washington College of Law. This first law degree from Pontifical Catholic University of Chile. And he also has expensive publication record. I can't go on like go on our publications. Let me just mention one. In 2020 he published a chapter important chapter human rights and international environmental law in the rootlage handbook of international environmental law second edition. So, Dr. We'll address the very timely topic tonight a human rights based approach to the new tree and plastics. Maybe no negotiation began in that new treaty back in November December of last year in Uruguay with hopefully treaty concluded by the end of 2024. So let's hear his views and on what a treaty might look like what it should like should look like hopefully, and we expect to have his talk go on for 45 minutes or so and then we'll turn over to question answer discussion period. So, Marcos, over to you and we're so glad you took time out of your busy schedule to join us tonight from Washington DC. Thanks. Thank you very much, David for that kind of introduction and thank you to the sponsors of the 14th annual lecture. I am deeply honored to join you here today. I apologize for having to had rescheduled previously that was beyond my my ability but I as I said I'm deeply honored to pay tribute to Professor Douglas Johnston as you mentioned David he has contributed greatly to the field of environmental law and marine law and international law generally. I was not aware that Professor mine her dolly had passed away and I also want to pay tribute to his memory and to his scholarship in the field. Plastics we live in a in a world of plastics we breathe it we it can be found in the in the highest peaks in the in the deepest trenches of the sea. And it was high time that the international community took stock about this global crisis and embarked on negotiations for a comprehensive and legally binding instrument that can address this threat. What do human rights have to do with this that's what I'll be focusing on and if I am able now to navigate this technology to put on screen. This presentation. Now, at this time, I understand that you may see the first slide. Perfect. And my image on the right or the left, both images. Okay, so we managing to navigate the, the technology. There are a number of things that I'd like to cover but time was of course, limited. First want to give you a big background on the, the mandate on toxic and human rights of the Human Rights Council, by a way of contextualizing what human rights can say about a new plastics pollution treaty. In order to get a sense of why this treaty is urgent. A few words about the global plastics crisis is in order. We will address some of the key critical impact human rights impacts of the plastics life cycle. Look at certain international instruments concerning plastics and talk about fragmentation and limited approaches gaps shortcomings and so forth. Talk about the ongoing negotiations, as David just mentioned, they have started very recently and so there's a lot of ground there to cover. They include outlining certain human rights principles for a chemically safe circular economy that I hope will be integrated into the negotiations and ultimately reflected into the new plastic pollution treaty. So without further ado, jumping into the Human Rights Council mandate on toxic and human rights when it when created back in 1995. This was a very controversial mandate. It's a mandate known as the system of special procedures or special rapporteur working groups at the time it was very controversial. It was framed as in a finger pointing exercise of the south against the north for the transfer of hazardous wastes and they're dumping in in developing countries. It was announced as a crime as an expression of environmental racism, and I have a link here to a trailer that I want to put in a couple of minutes but I want to point out that it was a voted mandate at the beginning. This may sound a bit as a UN E's as sometimes he said, but in the political dynamics of the mandate this meant that the countries that voted against it and those were largely industrialized block of countries in the then Human Rights Commission. They were doing what they could to undermine the mandate and that began to change and with the advent and the creation of the Human Rights Council, the winds of consensus blowing in Geneva, and the reframing of the mandate so that it wouldn't address just the north south transfer of hazardous wastes, but it would address the life cycle of chemicals and waste and this is important because exposure to chemicals and waste can have severe impacts on the effective employment of a range of internationally protected human rights, such as the right to life, the right to health, the right to personal integrity, the right to food, the right to water, the right to sanitation and certainly the right to a clean, healthy and sustainable environment. With the reframing of the mandate to look at life cycle of chemicals and waste, the opportunities for the mandate to engage topical issues of international law on toxics or concerning toxics are greatly amplified and I'm very pleased that because of its renewal it by consensus at the Human Rights Council now the global partnership north south has embraced the mandate and it's very supportive of of its work. Now, in order to illustrate some of the issues that arise in the mandates work, I thought I'd play this short two minute trailer. I've never heard anything like that. A pile of waste that close to a city with that high of arsenic concentration. Now it's 15 years since the first time I followed the tracks from my home building in Sweden to my birth land, Chile, and the city of Oaken, Rica. He was my reason for everything that I was doing. Let's take it away. In the middle of the 80's, the residents sent almost 20,000 tons of waste to the city of Rica. And the right to waste was a playground. The doctors of Santiago had never shut up because they didn't like it because they said it was an alarm for the people. I'm going to have to go back to my room. We're a little bit like this where we had the start of the revolution, the president's goal towards the big. The waste that the residents sent to Chile in the middle of the 80's continues to cause great damage. In four years of preparation, the waste management process was made to come after an attentional documentary. It was left to go around like this. Hello, how are you? Hello, how are you? I'm here to make the biggest right to waste the history of the waste management. Is it yours? No, it's mine. I have to get to the point. The waste management is mainly responsible for the waste management of the city of Oaken. Where are you going? Where are you going? Where are you going? We have a lot of instruments. Now this language is important because there are significant gaps in certain instruments. I've presented a report to the Human Rights Council last September on the Minamata Convention on Mercury and issues concerning small scale mining and human rights. Small scale mining being the largest emitter of Mercury to the environment and growing. In my forthcoming report coming September, I'll talk about gaps and shortcomings and developments in navigation. Human rights, this I understand will be a first report looking at this interface. The mandate also carries out country visits. I mentioned this because I'll come back to this. My predecessor had the opportunity to visit Canada. I visited Ghana last December, Paraguay last October, and I am conducting an organization visit to the International Maritime Organization. I understand that is also a first and I'll come back to that in a minute. So that is the mandate. Key tools, thematic reports in 2021 presented a report on plastics and human rights, noting the clear gaps that exist in the fragmented landscape in international instruments that concern plastics and making a call for a new treaty on plastics pollution. I was very pleased when the UN Environment Assembly took on this call and set up an intergovernmental negotiating committee with the mandate to develop a new legally binding instrument, but more on that in a minute. A couple of remarks about the global plastics crisis. So here we're seeing a graph that's put out by the UN Environment Program, it's a partner-centered grid, Arundel, that shows the volume of plastics that's being produced and much of it, most of it being released. Large-scale manufacturing of plastics started in the 1950s at, what, 2 million tons. Today, the annual production of plastics is 415 million tons, and it's projected to quadruple by 2050. Sometimes we hear the phrase, there will be more plastics than fish in the oceans. Now, this is a global problem. There are only a few companies that produce most polymers, so in that sense there's a parallel with what at the time was the dynamics around the negotiations of the Montreal Protocol and also depleting substances. But at the same time, supply chains and consumption involve all, if not most, of countries in the world. So we're facing a global problem that is late to get worse unless decided action is taken. Now, this graph again speaks of the volumes of production and most of it ends up in waste, large parts of it in the seas. I want to highlight, however, that plastics is not just a waste management issue. Here's a graph that appears in a story by CBC News. That could be topical. It's a few years ago now. There's new studies that confirm this story, so the graphs are still relevant. And as I'm saying, plastics is not just a waste management issue. It is a toxic issue. And that is because studies estimate that there are more than 10,000 chemicals that are added to plastics. Now, these chemicals are added to plastics for a variety of reasons to make them transparent to make them hard to make them flexible. There are various reasons why they're added. The point is that many of these chemicals are persistent organic pollutants, meaning they bioaccumulate in humans, they bioaccumulate in wildlife. They are capable of long range transport. So they're not just a local environmental problem. They add to the toxification of the planet to the toxic burden that humanity is facing. And many of these chemicals are also endocrine disrupting chemicals. So they disrupt essential functions of organisms, including reproduction. And that's where these graphs become relevant. Sperm counts declining and approaching expected to approach zero. What does that have to say from a human rights angle in regards to the rights of future generations? This is one of the big questions that human rights is facing about the scope of its application and whether future generations also can be said to have rights. I want to put on slide there as we speak about the rights of future generations in human rights law, the first evidence of microplastics in human placenta. There's a lot of uncertainty about what these microplastics can do and will do or their impact. This is a study from 2021. So the science is shedding further light. What's clear is that the human placenta microplastics is not a place for them. And so in terms of prevention, in terms of precaution, there are a number of arguments that should be considered there. And then this slide, I want to put it on screen because the magnitude of the crisis that I'm speaking about is massive. But despite its magnitude, it is a problem that can be tackled. It is a problem that can be solved. Now for that to happen, it is key that all dimensions of the problem are addressed. And that includes certainly environment, but also trade, technology, biodiversity. And one of the points I'm highlighting is that human rights are part of that equation. Because every stage of the cycle of plastics, and this slide shows production, use, waste, and then they're releasing to the environment. Every stage concerns human rights. I'd like to explore that a little further in this next section. What are these stages? Extraction, production, transport, use, waste. One point that I wish to make at the outset is that these impacts fall disproportionately on groups that may find themselves in vulnerable situations. Workers in fence line communities, in plastics facilities that are exposed to hazardous substances released in the production process. Indigenous peoples that live in the rainforests of the world where oil and gas are extracted. Children that play with plastic toys, future generations, as we were just discussing. These groups often are neglected in the marketplace of ideas in the political processes. They're often the subject of structural and ongoing discrimination, which limits their ability to participate in influence plastics policy. If we look at that in further detail, this slide shows a picture that I took in an academic visit, exploratory visit to Peru a few months ago. It was taken in so-called Lot 192 in the Peruvian Amazon in the north for several decades. This was one of the oil lots that produced most oil in the country. It hasn't been in operation for some time, the companies involved, the government speak about cleanup that there has been restoration. This is the reality of restoration on the ground. Extraction of oil and gas, let's recall plastics is oil and gas in a different form. The feedstocks of fossil fuels needed to produce plastics come from Indigenous peoples, lands and territories who have endured decades of contamination of their lands, their bodies and their communities. So the toxic legacy of extraction, the toxic impacts of oil and gas extraction. Will the new treaty go upstream and address this issue? Well, that's the key question that I'm putting forward to the negotiations. The next stage that I'd like to discuss is transport. This visual shows the express pearl. You may recall the vessel that caught fire and had this collapsed off the coasts of Sri Lanka. It was loaded, among other things, with plastic nerdles that contaminated the beaches and the coastline, impacting the lives of fisherfolk and others that depend on the seas for livelihoods and sustenance. It raises a whole range of questions as to how our plastics dealt with in the international regulatory instruments concerning the prevention of pollution from vessels. So I'll come back to that in a minute. The point here is that, again, we see one of the stages of the cycle of plastics and instance transport and how it can impair the effective enjoyment of human rights. Then we have production. As I was saying earlier, people living in fence line communities, living close by to the facilities that produce plastics that emit hazardous substances to the air, to the water. This is a slide from women that have organized in so-called Cancer Alley in Louisiana in the United States. Communities of African descent bearing the disproportionate burden of toxic exposure. These women have denounced this as a form of environmental racism that can be seen precisely because of the impacts of toxic exposure, but not only that, it's also they denounce discrimination in regards to zoning. So where in certain parishes, so the analog of counties will decide not to cite hazardous waste facilities or plastics plants. These are being cited predominantly in neighborhoods and parishes inhabited by people of African descent. So the environmental racism is something that the mandate on toxics and human rights is also addressing. Each one of these cases that I'm putting slides on has been brought to the attention of the mandate by the people concerned. And you may find in the mandate's website, I'll put that in the last slide, references to letters that have been sent to, say in the case of Arica to the government of Sweden to bullied in the company to the government of Chile. In this instance to the government of the United States in the previous slide to the slides to the governments of Peru and so forth. Use is another for stage of the plastic cycle where human rights are apparent children in future generations the slide shows a dispenser for for babies. The the plastic toys, you know, the, the lack of information in this area is sometimes appalling. I've often received communications from from parents of newborns that are asking about how can I learn about the plastic contents, or the toxic additives in the plastics of the toys that I'm planning on buying for my kids. And that information is often not available, which speaks to the right to information, which also speaks to the inability of society or families to prevent exposure. When it comes to children, there are implications, certainly here also future generations. Most attention, however, has focused on plastic waste. There's, there's several dimensions to this I spoke about production of plastics and then how most plastics end up as wastes in the seas in landfills or burned and so forth. That's one dimension. There's another dimension in relation to the global environmental injustices that result from the global plastic crisis that are apparent in trade in plastic waste. This trade or so called trade often results in dumping next to poor communities in developing countries. The plastics in those communities are invariably burned, which releases air pollutants that are highly hazardous for human health, and, and the environment. This slide is taken in in Ghana, in the coast of across the capital that's actually me walking with the beach in December of last year a sea of plastic wastes. This has become also notorious among other countries for being on the receiving end of a global economy of electronic e wastes that for the most contain plastics. Now this is an area where the Basel convention that controls transboundary movements of hazardous hazardous wastes and their disposal has not yet managed to close. So these in all these stages as we've seen invariably human rights issues come into play when it comes to waste, the sound management of waste is a direct is in direct relation to the right to a non toxic environment among other among other rights. Now there are several international instruments that concern plastics, there are regional instruments, say, for example on on protection of disease that have a regional scope. There are several international instruments that are who subject matter concerns plastics, such as the ones I'll still address the Basel convention on hazardous wastes or marples or the instrument under the international maritime organization for the prevention of pollution from ships or the Stockholm convention on persistent organic pollutants. What we see here is fragmentation by region by waste type or by chemical type. And so there are many, many things that come falling through the cracks there are many plastics and their additives falling through the cracks. So, let's examine and explore some of that. The Basel convention is the oldest multilateral environmental agreement in the toxic and waste cluster, as sometimes it's being referred to, and in the recent years it has taken decided action in dealing with with plastics in 2019 it adopted amendments to annexes to eight and nine to close what was then regarded in a sham recycling loophole. And so the are the, the, the experts would label and argue that their exports were of plastics were for recycling but they were not because the recycling capacities did not exist or because simply it was cheaper to dump the plastics in poor communities in developing communities. I want to recall that the first mandate holder in the, the toxics and human rights mandate her very first report speaks about the, the dangers for human rights or sham recycling and we see this still happening once and again. And in respect of Ghana, how the waste was a significant problem. Basel is perhaps the key instrument internationally dealing with this matter it has produced technical guidelines to address it. But the guidelines have a huge gap and I would say a loophole a shortcoming, because they consider that equipment that is exported for reuse, including repair is not waste. And so if it is not waste, then it doesn't fall under the controls of the instrument. Now, there, there was an amendment last year, promoted precisely by Ghana and Switzerland to amend annex two of the convention to include a waste and that will subject the these stream of ways to the prior informed consent procedure of the convention. And this is the key mechanism of control that this convention establishes. Now, that is, in regards to in this, the instances where these equipments are considered waste. That's precisely the question and the problem that the technical guidelines, consider that the equipment export for reuse including repairs are not waste. They are often so exports of containers with a waste are labeled as for reuse, or that they will be repaired, but they are often beyond repair and they are actually waste. Anyway, that's big part of the problem here. Now in regards to plastic he was contained many plastic parts and as we'll see in a minute, many of these plastic parts also contain highly hazardous substances. The slide shows the IMO headquarters in, in London. What I wish to highlight here is that Marple, which was negotiated in the aftermath of the of the Tory Canyon disaster many in the audience may remember this maybe many may not it was a tanker that was a huge disaster releases of hundreds of thousands of fuel of the coasts of England. As a result of that, the IMO changed its mandate to address environmental protection, and it developed a new instrument, Marple later amended through protocols to address the prevention of pollution from ships now there's several annexes in in Marple. I want to highlight a couple one is annex five for the prevention of pollution by garbage from ships. So this annex bands the discharge into the sea of all plastic waste. Now, this is a very important development, no doubt. Now it also requires port states to have adequate port reception facilities. And this is in a way the Achilles heel of this annex, because many countries in the world do not have adequate port reception facilities, they take resources, they take know how technology. Many countries in the world, they also don't have the resources to create or adequately manage port reception facilities. So there is, there is a gap here in terms of implementation. There may be issues of design. Now in international environmental law, as many of you will be familiar with the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities according to which countries will pose that countries lacking the resources will receive financial and technological assistance from the industrialized countries in order to engage in a global partnership for the protection of the global environment. This would lead for greater cooperation in funding adequate port reception facilities. Now this is on the table at the IMO discussions and yet no action has been taken. So that's annex five on garbage. I also want to mention annex three for the prevention of pollution by harmful substances carried by sea in packaged form. It's a bit of a mouthful but these are things know they're subset they're not oil, they're not noxious substances they are pollutants, there's harmful substances. Now, are plastics a harmful substance. Should they be regarded a harmful substance by annex three. This is now being debated at the IMO if we look at the case of the express pearl. If, if they were regarded a marine pollutant and a harmful substance if they would be covered then by the international maritime dangerous goods code, which contains standards for transport packaging labeling and managing, etc. But so far, they are falling through the plastics the plastics noodles are falling through the cracks. Now this annex three contains detailed criteria in an appendix for the identification of what is a harmful substances substance in the singular. And so there's there are some very interesting legal questions and policy questions that need to be addressed in order to close this gap. But I don't want to go in the rabbit hole of Marple either I want to keep a rather big picture and talk about continue to talk about some of the gaps shortcomings developments in international instruments concerning plastics. This is a slide of the of the conference of the parties of the Basel Rottenham and Stockholm conventions and particularly interesting the Stockholm Convention on persistent organic pollutants at this time. Because several pops that are listed for elimination are used in public and plastic parts. Brominated flame retardants is an example of that polychlorinated bifurnails are common in electronic applications and many plastics use them e wastes can may contain them. What is interesting here is that plastics are also in several ways pushing the boundaries of what is understood as the criterion for criteria for listing in the in the pops convention. So the these criteria there they're very strict and the example of the chemical UV slash three to eight. Sounds a bit like a science fiction movie but this is a chemical that is used to shield plastic polymers from damage from ultraviolet radiation so that when exposed to the sun plastics don't break up or become damaged. Now, this UV three to eight is a persistent organic pollutants so by accumulates it's harmful to human health. It is capable through long range transport but that is the question is it capable of long range transport. Now the one of the arguments that has been addressed in the context of the science body of this convention is that micro plastics and their ubiquitousness in mean that this chemical is now able to reach the farthest corners of the earth and so it is capable of long range transport. So we see here an interface between plastics and the criteria for listing of persistent organic pollutants again one chemical at a time. If we consider that there are thousands of chemicals that are added to plastics, we see clearly that this approach is not an effective way of addressing the global plastics crisis. So, in regards to the limitations of existing approaches that's where negotiations on a treaty on plastics were being debated. And that's where the UN Environment Assembly that took place in Nairobi last February 2022 was a monumental moment in time. A couple elements of background. The UN Environmental Assembly of the UN Environment Program I could add was established in order to strengthen the environmental pillar of sustainable development by back in so called Rio plus 20 conference on sustainable development in 2012. Now has it achieved its goal well it's it's making progress for several years since its creation. It had adopted resolutions on plastics it had established an ad hoc open ended expert group on marine litter and micro plastics so called a heck. So it's a lot of words, but the road tested story here is that first there is an approach to understanding the problem the science of figuring out what kind of options there may be to address it and then a debate as to how to move forward and and take action. And you need a 5.2 took stock of the work of a heck, it took note of the Basel amendments. The report that I put out to the General Assembly, the, the contributions of a number of voluntary initiatives around the world, and it came up with several resolutions. One of which concerns establishing an intergovernmental negotiating committee. But before I go to resolution 14 I thought I'd highlight a couple other resolutions coming out from the near 2022 meeting. The first one on on screen is the science policy panel. So, as we have the, as the international community can benefit from the intergovernmental panel on climate change and from it based on on biodiversity. There's nothing similar comparable in the chemicals and waste cluster. The first thematic report to the Human Rights Council is on the and was on the right to science, noting the gap, the misalignment between what we know the science tells us and regulatory responses. This gap is no accident it results from deliberate manipulation and disinformation and also calls for the establishment of a global science policy interface platform. This is a panel on chemicals, waste and pollution so I'm very pleased that you need has moved in this direction. But plastics is the topic of the night and so resolution 14 how to end plastics towards an international legally binding instrument. The key elements of the of this resolution are highlighted in this slide. In my opinion. So, setting up a negotiating committee. To develop a treaty on plastic pollution, including in the marine environment. I'll pause here and mention that there were several states at the environment assembly that were arguing that the treaty should focus on marine litter. And so others were saying is it's not possible to solve the problem of more of the protection of marine environment because because of plastics if we don't work in the full life cycle of plastics and that's the third bullet there. So the last one is with the ambition of completing its work by the end of 2024. So that's not a lot of time. And it poses the risk, as we've seen in other international treaty processes and negotiations in the environmental sphere. So the convention being an example where the result is our compromises of the last minute leading to poor drafting ambiguous language, sometimes called kicking the can, or because or the agreement to disagree. The UN at times and diplomats of times are very skillful at speaking or writing in a way that says that doesn't say much that doesn't says nothing. Let's put it that way. And that doesn't solve the problems. I want to be very explicit on that. As you can see, its work is ongoing. As David mentioned, I can see one already met in Uruguay. If you visit the website of this meeting there's very good information on on plastics, generally on various dimensions of plastics. And this is what's coming up with the expectation that there will be a diplomatic conference in 2025. A couple issues I wish to highlight here on form and structure, which is a hotly debated at this time. And some states who argue that what we need is a is an analog to a framework convention that can host national action plans. Now this is very attractive to many states, because these national action plans allow for their special circumstances to be reflected in tailored approaches. It's also very attractive to many states because national action plans are a vehicle for international cooperation so funding for the elaboration implementation of these national action plans. Now there's a big question as to whether national action plans are effective when it comes to Minamata on Mercury and small scale mining that relies on national action plans. It's not been effective. There are issues of design and implementation there that we could leave for the Q&A. By contrast, there are several who argue that the form and structure of the treaty should establish clear global objectives, control measures for the various stages of the of the plastic cycle. There are also panics that can be modified easily to address changing circumstances and specifics. Now in this model some argue that the IMO's tacit amendment process can be of help, we can get back to that in the Q&A there were questions on that. So this is one of the key issues of form and structure. What is also relevant to highlight here is that the UNEA resolution that sets up the whole negotiations already has clear indications of what it sees as building blocks. I may not use this language but it does talk about definitions and reduction of plastic pollution and certainly national action plans, scientific and socioeconomic assessments, the coordination with relevant international mechanisms, technical and financial mechanisms and some have also put on the table the idea of a plastic tax in order to raise the revenue that is needed in order to fund the implementation of this far reaching and ambitious new international instrument. I'm running out of time, but I do want to highlight a couple human rights standards and principles for a chemically safe circular economy. Now this goes beyond plastics but certainly has implications for plastics. So overcoming a linear take, make, waste approach and move towards a zero waste and pollution economy. This is a big challenge. So what are some of the standards and rights and principles that arise. Well I would like to start with the right to a clean, healthy and sustainable environment which for the first time last year has been recognized at the global level by the UN General Assembly. Now this has implications for the toxic additives that are added to plastics and for one and also for the north south transfer of the plastic toxic burden so trade in plastic waste and so forth. I also want to highlight the rights to information so information as students of environmental law will very quickly point out is the gateways the key to making informed environmental management decisions, and yet we are seeing this information as funded by the plastics industry that has coined recycling as the solution to this problem now I have denounced this as a concerted attack against the right to science, because in actual reality less than 10% of plastics are recycled. There is no capacity and the fact that there are hazardous chemicals added to plastics make the bulk the large amount of plastics unrecyclable it is not possible to recycle them. So this is a divert attention tactic it's a delay tactic. It also changes the frame of reference instead of public regulation to individual responsibility. But here there is a clear role for governments in a rights based approach highlights that framework of rights oblique rights bearers duty bearers and accountability. So what kinds of information are needed here well registration of polymers volumes of production. Production of plastics will be reduced there needs to be information on volumes of production that is accessible. If there's going to be a move to a truly circular economy, there needs to be information on which chemicals are added to plastics. So let's talk about the right to science and this information, and to also highlight the right to participate. It's often the case, as I mentioned earlier that disadvantage groups groups in vulnerable situation are suffering the brunt of plastic human rights impacts and yet they don't have the ability to participate in plastics. A human rights based approach looks at reality from the perspective of vulnerable groups. What does it what does reality look like when a person is suffering from exposure to hazardous chemicals and wastes, and that is where several principles stem from prevention and precaution have been elaborated in the environmental and have now been accepted and incorporated in the human rights field. So this raises issues of reduction of production, but also the assessment of the potential impacts of proposed solutions. Some people speak about false solutions. So incineration for the argument why worry about the plastics problem, simply burn them and produce fuel from the plastics. Well, incineration releases dangerous dioxins and furans dioxins are some of the most hazardous substances known to humans on this planet. It releases polychlorinated biphenyls to the air toxic ash. The Stockholm Convention on persistent organic pollutants addresses some of these issues dioxins as unintended pops through national action plans precisely now have they been effective. The answer is unfortunately not really the these maps, they are certainly contribution but they have not slowed down the release of of dioxins as measured in in the air. Now bio plastics, often also come in the equation. Bio plastics, they come into competition with crops. So there's a dimension of the right to food that sometimes comes into play. Now the key point here, the perspective of the toxic expanded is that bio plastics also have toxic additives. They may not be produced from oil and gas or fossil fuels, but they do have toxic additives so they add to the dimension of the planet through the toxic burden of human bodies. The polluter pace principle, so much could be said here but I want to focus on one thing extended producer responsibility, several countries are establishing these schemes in order to transfer the cost of managing from the municipalities that operate landfills to the importers or the producers, but there's a, the cost of establishing these schemes is at times exorbitant. And so these EPR schemes, they're important, they should be covering national action plans, but how are they going to be funded in countries that don't have the resources. Now that is where the global environmental dimension of the plastic problem all again comes into play should exporters of plastics be involved in dealing with the covering the costs of the pollution cost by their products. That's where extended producer responsibilities across boundaries comes into play. For the sake of time I'll move quickly to two last points just transition. This is a concept that was born in the climate space. What is now finding expression in every dimension of environmental of environmental change, given the impacts of reform on on on certain industries, certain individuals, workers, and so forth waste pickers is a is a as an example here. And finally, on accountability. This is a key element of the right spaced approach. I wish to highlight two things. There's already a legacy of plastic pollution and who is going to clean that up. Will the treaty deal with that. The environmental restoration the guys that are floating on the oceans that well, is that will we as the international community receive an apology or will the treaty take action to deal with that. And how will the liability be apportioned. And then there's also the possibility of establishing cooperation mechanisms between enforcement agencies in countries of the world. Okay, I'm now 10 minutes over time so apologies for that I will simply conclude by pointing out that the global plastic crisis calls for urgent action at all levels. We should address each of the stages of the plastics life cycle and the human rights based approach is key for a legitimate and effective treaty on plastic pollution. And with that I wish to thank you very much for your attention and welcome any questions or reactions that that you may have. Thank you. Thank you so much for that tremendous the broad coverage of a very difficult topic. I'll turn over to Sarah sec now who is professor of law here at the law school, who works very much in the marine environmental field but particularly in business and environmental law. So Sarah will kind of manage the question and answer. You can use the chat box for questions. You could also use your raise hand function if you go on reactions at the button that below on zoom you can hit that and have raised your hand so we'll go both ways and I think Debra's going to monitor the hand raising as well so I'll turn over to Sarah. Thank you David and thank you very much Marcus for a very comprehensive and exciting presentation for those of us, perhaps especially their number of students in the room I know who've also been thinking about the plastics challenge with me and through a human rights based approach and I know they and everyone else is very intrigued and excited to have learned so much. I was encouraged to ask a question while waiting for others to ask questions. So I'm, I'm going to do that to start off. I think what you have done, especially with the principles and in the work is really to illustrate what a human rights based approach to the treaty should look like could look like in terms of sort of the elements of the treaty that that might that would ideally be there. But the question I have is, do you anticipate that there may be specific reference to human rights in this treaty, or would you anticipate that it's more likely that to the extent that human rights come into the treaty it's going to be sort of implicit in terms of informing the structure and the kinds of provisions rather than explicit. So the thinking behind that is of course in the climate context, there was a huge push to have human rights explicitly referenced in the Paris agreement and they are in the preamble very briefly but then, you know, then there's sort of debates about the extent to which they informed the actual structure of the treaty. So I'm curious to get your impressions on on that particular question. Thank you Sarah for for getting the ball rolling. So, I, there are some regional groups that have already raised the importance of explicit human rights language in the treaty negotiations. I mentioned the there's there's precedent here. When it comes to human rights there has been much more, I would say, openness there's still some level of resistance but more openness to addressing and incorporating environmental issues, but from the environmental side of things. There has been much more resistance to incorporating human rights language. Now some of that resistance is inertia. Some of it is lack of an understanding of a what is a human rights based approach. Some of it is also the institutional competitions between within government between ministries and circumstances. So while the environment ministry may take the lead for example in the negotiation implementation of environmental treaties should an instrument be regarded as a human rights instrument that will bring in a whole different set of members and so the inter intra government inter agency discussions become a reason for many not to to want to for many new environmental negotiation not to want to talk about human rights explicitly. In the experience of the Paris agreement on on climate change, as David mentioned in mind in his introduction. I had the opportunity to act on behalf of I like which is a group of Latin American countries that share similar positions and one of our key negotiating objectives was the introduction of explicit human rights language into in that instrument. So we set out to create alliances and coalitions and engage in argumentation and so forth. Now the, the, the goal was for the objective of that instrument to refer to human rights. But that eventually or ultimately did did not did not crystallize in the text and instead it's only the preamble in respect of climate action. Nevertheless has been quite important I would say because in litigation in domestic jurisdiction around the world, the case of Brazil is illustrative in its Supreme Court deciding that the Paris agreement is also a human rights instrument. There are some implications for the for the kinds of enforcement and application of human rights instruments in in the country. And so there is a there is a not only a symbolic guiding value in the preamble and the interpretation but also when it comes to actual implementation and use in at the national level. And so that's why the definition of human rights language is relevant. Now it has been brought to my attention that the Paris agreement is not the first environmental instrument to address to include explicit human rights language that the framework convention tobacco control already did so. I would say there's a growing movement and recognition and awareness of the importance of explicit human rights language in environmental instruments. I will lastly point out that as you mentioned. It is not just the the language for the language it's also in the design of the of the instrument and so even if there's no explicit human rights language if human rights principles and standards can permeate the design of the instrument that I would say is more important than a token mention of human rights in the preamble and then forgetting about a rights based approach. Thank you that was a great, very comprehensive and great great answer. I'm going to turn first to Anya for a question and then to Jason. Hi, thank you so much for your presentation. My question is about the precautionary principle, just given the vast amount of knowledge and research that's needed for these thousands of chemicals in the state of our knowledge about that at the time is there. Do you anticipate a large role for the precautionary principle and the treaty to kind of address these gaps. React immediately. Yeah. Sure. Thank you Anya for for that. The precautionary principle or approach according to some has been a point of contention in international environmental negotiations now for several decades. But its relevance is beyond dispute. Regardless of whether it's a principle or an approach. The fact remains that there is considerable uncertainty on several layers of the impacts of plastics on on on human health and the environment and these layers of uncertainty result from the, the changing chemicals that are used the inclusion of chemical or new synthetic chemicals of the different behavior of nano particles as opposed to macro plastics. So science is evolving. This is a constant challenge in environmental policy of taking decisions in situations of incomplete information with with changing with changing science. The importance of the precaution principle cannot be understated in this regard I anticipate that that it will play an important element in the design of the treaty. It may be, for example, through dealing with chemicals as a class, not just one by one. It may also be through the constant assessments of the science and the effectiveness of the instrument. It may be through the operation of a science and policy interface platform that is able to account for the uncertainties. So, so yes, I think that the precautionary principle alongside others such as prevention polluter pace and and just transition will play a very important role in the design and operation of the instrument. Thank you very much. Jason. Hi, thank you and thanks for such a wonderful and comprehensive and interesting presentation. I'm particularly curious in light of your remarks about industry disinformation disinformation and obstruction. How you envision or how you hope the treaty will go about tackling the critical goal of reducing extraction and reducing production. And I asked that just by way of really brief context, also in thinking about the just transition. To the Russian invasion of Ukraine, there was the emergence of more and more discourse about the oil and gas industry beginning to have to reckon with declines in declining demand and declining production forecasts and worrying discourse about the oil and gas industries so called plan B, being increasing plastic plastic production so running those two things together. What are your thoughts about how to tackle that in the treaty. Yes, thanks Jason I think you've put your finger on a on one of the key issues on how is it that the treaty will make a dent and actually reduce the volume of production, because it is one thing for the treaty to set up a structure of international cooperation on national action plans where states will in their national legislation and and practices establish a recycling schemes and collection schemes and I don't mean to minimize that because it is important. It is expensive, but yet important. There may be minimum recycling contents and so forth. But the reduction in production is the key of perhaps even the, the litmus test to see whether the treaty will be effective. Because, as I mentioned, plastics pollution problem is not just a waste management. It involves all these stages. And from the toxic mandates perspective, a key problem is the toxics that are added into into the plastics. And there's a couple things that I would mention it seemed to me that information on volumes of production is is key, because without having that baseline and without that data becomes very hard if not impossible really to control and aim at reductions of production. That's one. Second, the control measures in relation to global objectives. Many in the negotiations are seeing the Paris agreement as a model for as a template even for the as a blueprint. Who would establish global objective and then a mechanism to get their company with transparency and and stop taking processes. Now that may that again is, but is that effective is that useful will will deliver is the Paris agreement delivering. That's a great question and the science and the trajectory of emissions. I mean, the profits of oil and gas companies amidst global oil and gas crisis is the record profits and so we're facing a structural problem where the in human rights, the the framework established for articulating the responsibilities of businesses is not proving to be sufficiently robust to deal with problems that are putting in jeopardy human existence in the planet when it comes to diversification, it is not just the right to exist, but the right to live in dignity. And so this is of course an issue of common concern for humanity. One more thing is that been looking very attentively at several jurisdictions, passing legislation to greenwashing and this may be an element that directly ties with what you're putting on the table Jason offer of how will the oil and gas industry spin its contribution to solving the global plastics crisis. So this may be an area where greenwashing legislation plays a role to come to curb to discipline to and then to inform consumers that today currently lack the requisite information to make informed decisions. We do have a question in the chat which I'm going to read. What steps do we need to take on an international level to have the voices heard from underdeveloped communities that are suffering disproportionately so that these concerns can be implemented in international policy. Thanks for the question in the chat. This is another key point because the conversation at the international level that will result in this treaty needs to be informed by the voices of those who stand to suffer the most by the problem. In order for this outcome to be legitimate. In my report to the UNGA General Assembly on plastics and human rights I point to good practices that are emerging internationally on involving civil society and vulnerable groups in decision making in environmental treaty making the Eskazoo agreement on environmental rights in Latin America and the Caribbean is a is a clear example. However, when it comes to the rules of procedures for the elaboration of the treaty for the negotiations that have been established here. We see a repeat of well what is a kind of a template that exists in several MEAs. So it's an intergovernmental negotiation. The term intergovernmental is often stressed to exclude voices of civil society, waste pickers, indigenous people and others. Now that there's also reference in the rules of procedure to rules that were set out in the the Rio conference on environment and development of 1992. So this is 30 years ago now. Is this regression or is this are we frozen in time and haven't we as international international community not learned anything in 30 years about the importance of public participation at every level so giving concrete and real expression to principle 10 of the question that recast this paradigm of sustainable development precisely to give expression to the right to participate. You know, that's a rhetorical question of course the point is that I'm trying to make is that the rules of procedure they're quite rigid, but there are possible entry points for voices of indigenous communities, indigenous peoples, workers, fence line communities in the process. If we look back at the Minamata negotiation process. So this is the most recent multilateral environmental agreement negotiation process. We see that much of the inclusive approach that has been heralded in that process has was the result of the of the leadership from the presidency and the bureau. And so we're, we're hoping and expecting and I say we as the international community here that that the current process will not regress in those in the in that experience, despite the rigidity of the rules. Thank you. I was actually wondering specifically about indigenous communities in light I think of the, the, sorry, in a with circumpolar conference I think has been making submissions in terms of requesting or requesting greater opportunity to participate. Sort of on a separate question, perhaps flowing from Jason's, because I don't see other questions at this moment. I thought I'd ask actually if you have any reflections on, or if you've seen anything about the idea of plastic credits as something that might come into the treaty and, and I guess I've encountered plastic credits the idea that the company would put up money, which would then be used, which would then be go towards sort of the waste management aspect and recycling aspect but this strikes me a bit as a license to continue polluting sort of like the offsetting in the climate regime and I was just curious if, if you had encountered this in the treaty process or had any, any reflections on it. Thanks Sarah I haven't encountered the specific idea of plastic credits I think it's, it's, it's interesting in that sense it's a bit provocative in that the analog with the climate and the carbon credits is well placed I would say. I would like to share the following reflection, a couple of years ago in collaboration with David Boyd, the special rapporteur on on human rights in the environment. We started looking at the Norwegian government's decision to allow for oil exploration in the Arctic, and there was a case before the Norwegian Supreme Court and we presented an amicus query brief in that, in that, in that case. One of the arguments that, and I think this is quite opposite because of the importance of plastic reduction and so it will starts with exploration, exploitation of oil resources. One of the arguments is that put crudely, it didn't matter whether more oil was drilled and exported because the various activities that in Norway would buy carbon credits. And so they would be offset. I find this argument line of argument that it is misplaced because the impacts on human rights are felt globally and so the extraterritorial dimensions of human rights do come into play. These are it doesn't matter where oil is burned. Second, there are byproducts of oil of pollution that affect fence like communities local communities that cannot be counted away through carbon credits, and the same applies with plastic to fuel plants and incineration of plastics and so that the same analog. And thirdly, and perhaps even more disturbingly, there's been a, well, what WikiLeaks reporting of the lack of integrity of carbon credits where they purport to reduce carbon but in reality they do not. I deal with the, the interface between decarbonization and detoxification in in my, I will deal with it in my next report to the Human Rights Council in September, which touches upon on upon this issue of false solutions and so, or misleading solutions or partial solutions in any event the carbon storage at times has been labeled using those terms. So, I don't think that we should put our hopes for a solution on trying to offset there's this risk for media shifting so the transfer of one polluting activity to another is is quite real. As the UN Convention on the law of the sea talks about this the recently concluded treaty on on on the conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity beyond national jurisdiction also talks about this. And I think that the plastic credits would run afoul of that provision. Thank you. I do hope so. You worry me. Thank you very much I see that our time is 832 and I'm, I saw a hand that went up and then went down but I'm going to defer to David and Deborah to see if we need to wrap things up now. I think we should. Maybe just in with some thanks. Thanks. Mark goes for that tremendously coverage of all the framing and array. And we have to look at international law to deal with this problem how we're looking for solutions and the possibility of human rights actually pushing the envelope. It would be great to have you back for another lecture because it really opened up a lot of things we couldn't get into the night. For example, even the persistent organic pollutants and maybe a need for a new comprehensive chemicals convention with, you know, got around 30 chemicals of controlling under that pops convention. It's not even scratching the surface. So I think you really opened a lot of doors and eyes to the complexity that we're dealing with. So thanks for that. And also for those to join tonight and thanks again for our sponsors and thanks for also Sarah for taking time sabbatical to do the q&a. And let's we really look forward to your report coming out in September. And it sounds like we're very interesting and very useful. I also teach international by my law so never my students are on the line tonight and I think you learned a lot will post us up on our class. Bright space so thanks for helping out there as well. So thanks so much. Real honor, David and Sarah. Thank you very much for the invitation to pay tribute. And, and to join you I'm sorry I couldn't make it to Halifax this time around but maybe at some point in the future there will be such opportunity in the in any event I look forward to continuing to read your publications and to be guided by by your scholarship. Thank you so much. Thank you maybe Deborah thanks to you as well and you want to say anything last thing from colleges sustainability. No, just thank you. It was very, very interesting and thanks to Spencer for tech assistant to Lori for hurting cats, and particularly to you Marcos thank you so much. Thank you. Good night everyone. Not everyone thank you. Thanks again Marcos. Great.