The largest share of plastic that enters the oceans comes from rivers in Asia. More than 80% of it.
Only a small amount comes from rivers across Europe and North America. Together, rivers in these regions contribute just 5% to 10% of the global total. This would suggest that the world’s richest countries don’t contribute much to the problem of plastic pollution.
But, these numbers only look at the plastic that is emitted domestically. [...]
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I estimate that a few percent – possibly up to 5% – of the world’s ocean plastics could come from rich countries exporting their waste overseas. That could bring the total up to 10%: 5% directly from rivers in these regions, plus a further 5% from trade.
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The idea that most of the world’s plastic waste is shipped overseas is incorrect. One reason why this figure is so low is that it’s mostly recycled waste that’s traded, and only 20% of the world’s plastic is recycled.
Over the last decade, we’ve seen a large decline in the amount of plastic waste traded. Rates have fallen by two-thirds since 2010.
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The reason for this dramatic decline was the Chinese government banning the import of most types of plastic waste in 2017. This was part of a broader policy decision to stop the import of 24 different types of solid waste including paper, textiles, and plastics. These bans were implemented as a result of environmental and health concerns from contaminated waste streams.
This ban had two major impacts. The first was that the total volume of plastic trade globally dropped significantly – we saw earlier that global trade has halved since 2017. The second was that other countries emerged to take China’s place as major importers. Most of them are also countries in Asia – Malaysia, Vietnam, Indonesia, the Philippines, and Turkey, started to import much more plastic than in previous years.
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Europe is the region that exports the most plastic, but it's also the region that imports the most.
This is true more generally. Most plastic is traded within a given region. European countries export most plastic to other European countries. Asian countries export most to other Asian countries.
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This is also true of Asia, where Japan is the biggest exporter to other countries in Asia.
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When it comes to the fraction of plastic waste that is exported, the UK is one of the largest exporters. For context, the US exported about 5% of its plastic waste in 2010. France exported 11%, and the Netherlands exported 14%.
Most rich countries are net exporters of plastic waste. And this can be a significant fraction of their waste. But it’s not the case that they handle most of it by offshoring it to other countries.
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The probability that mismanaged waste ends up in the ocean varies a lot by country.
The country where the probability is highest is the Phillippines – an estimated 7% ends up in the ocean.
From the article:
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