In the shadow of the president’s tariff struggles Donald Trump a different type of commercial war is being developed that involves wrappers of candy and plastic bottles.
On Tuesday, Malaysia, which received more discarded plastic from rich countries than any other developing country last year, effectively prohibited All shipments of plastic waste from the United States.
It may not seem great.
But the United States has increasingly resorted to countries such as Malaysia to manage plastic garbage.
American scrap merchants sent more than 35,000 tons of plastic waste To Malaysia last year, according to commercial data analyzed by Basel Action Network, a non -profit organization that follows up the problem of plastic waste.
Last year, after seizing more than 100 containers of hazardous materials sent from angels and labeled incorrectly as raw materials, Malaysian Minister of Malaysia, Nik Nazmi, told the press:
«We do not want Malaysia to become the garbage collector of the world ».
The Ministry of Investment, Commerce and Industry of Malaysia did not respond to a request for comments on Tuesday.
The agitation in the little known trade of plastic waste has its origin in the decision of China in 2018, for the same reasons as Malaysia, to prohibit imported paper and plastic imports.
Before that, China had accepted for years until half of plastic and the paper discarded in the world.
Since then, Western nations have fought against the accumulation of plastic garbage.
United States recycles less than 10 % of the plastic that discards.
(Food pollution and other materials present in plastic waste hinders recycling, and a significant part of plastic, such as fried potato bags that contain layers of different plastics and other materials, it simply cannot be recycled profitable).
The rest ends in landfills, is incinerated or sent abroad.
And while new destinations abroad have emerged, more and more countries are beginning to reject trash.
This year, Thailand and Indonesia also announced the ban on plastic waste imports.
The world produces almost 500 million tons plastic per year, more than double that two decades ago, and a growing amount of plastic waste appears on the coasts and banks of the rivers, as well as in whales, birds and other animals that ingest them.
Researchers estimate that the equivalent of a plastic garbage truck reaches the ocean Each minute.
The prohibition of China “shocked the world trade of plastic waste,” said Tony R. Walker, professor at the School of Environmental Resources and Studies at the University of Dalhouse in Halifax, Nueva Scotia, who investigates the global flow of plastic waste.
The countries that began to accept that discarded plastic “were quickly overwhelmed,” he added.
Much of that plastic garbage ends in landfills or is incinerated, which releases harmful air pollution, or simply the environment is released.
People in rich countries can assume that the plastic that separates diligently is recycled, he said, something he called “cycle of wishes.”
However, instead of going to the recycling system, “much is redirected to waste,” he explained.
The Malaysian Customs Law prohibits all shipments of plastic waste from countries that have not signed the Basel Convention, a global agreement that regulates hazardous waste, including plastic.
This places the United States, the only important country that It is not part of the agreementin a especially delicate situation.
Limitations
The modified law also establishes strict restrictions on imports of plastic waste from other countries, establishing that they must contain only one type of plastic, with a maximum of 2% pollution, to ensure that imported plastics are recycled and not discarded.
This level would be difficult to reach for any plastic residue collected from consumers.
In an email to the customers sent on June 20 and shared with The New York Times, Steve Wong, executive director of the Fukutomi plastic waste brokerage company, said that the shipments of plastic waste to Malaysia had already “virtually paralyzed.”
Ross Eisenberg, president of America’s Plastic Makers, an industrial group, said that the effects of Malaysia’s import policy on plastic waste remained uncertain.
However, “our industry is still focused on expanding the use of recycled plastics in new products,” he said.
“These efforts support US employment and promote economic growth, while retaining our natural resources and helping to prevent contamination by plastics.”
The prohibition of Malaysia to imports of plastic waste from the United States was motivated by the discovery of hundreds of containers full of electronic waste and dangerous plastics that had been falsely declared as raw materials to avoid the country’s commercial control laws, said Wong Pui Yi, a Basel Action Network researcher.
However, local industrial associations have urged the government to raise the prohibition of clean and recyclable plastic imports, arguing that these are necessary for manufacturers to fulfill their objectives of recycled content.
Marks like Nestlé, Coca-Cola and Pepsi They have pledged to use more recycled material in their products, according to CC CHEAH, president of the Association of Plastics Manufacturers of Malaysia, and the Malaysian recycling industry could still play an important role.
Kate O’Neill, Professor of Environmental Sciences, Policies and Management at the University of California, Berkeley, said that the prohibition of Malaysia could imply that plastic waste begins to flow to other countries with less capacity to manage them.
The monitoring will be important, he added.
“The recycling industry has not yet adapted to disruption, so these exports remain necessary“.
Therefore, experts claim more and more than, in addition to investing in recycling infrastructure, policies are needed to help control plastic production, for example, reducing the demand for single -use plastics.
New agreement
Some countries that negotiate a new treaty to reduce plastic pollution have also requested limits to plastic production.
This could come from packaging designs that reduce the use of plastic, measures such as the prohibition of plastic bags and general policies that make manufacturers more responsible for the waste generated by their products.
These policies have spread throughout the United States and the world.
On Tuesday, a law that prohibits large hotels to provide small and disposable plastic bottles for personal hygiene products such as shampoo and conditioner.
(Smaller hotels have until 2026 to meet).
Also on Tuesday, Delaware began prohibiting restaurants from providing food foam containers, plastic beverage agitators and plastic chopsticks for cocktails and sandwiches, and requires that single -use plastic straws only be delivered at the customer’s request.