Context

In 2022, 175 countries agreed to develop a legally binding agreement on plastic pollution by 2024.  To get there, nations are taking part in five rounds of negotiations to agree the text of the global plastic treaty. The second round of negotiations were derailed due to the imposing influence of powerful, oil producing countries and actors. 

Our activity

Working with the Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA) in the third round of negotiations, we sought to build greater awareness through the media of the need for an ambitious treaty. Such a treaty should focus on truly addressing the plastic pollution crisis by exposing bad actors and tackling overproduction, rather than getting bogged down in false alternatives. 

We supported EIA’s proactive and reactive media outreach, highlighting the impact on the treaty of global news such as the expansion of the BRICs and the formation of the Global Coalition for Plastic Sustainability. Through our work, we sought to place media pressure of ‘ambitious’ countries such as the UK to match up their rhetoric with their action.

Our impact

We successfully increased media opportunities by 100% compared to the previous round of negotiations, helping to push media attention on the treaty beyond trade press into mainstream media. 

We secured over 100 pieces of coverage over a 4-month period, with a global spread of coverage on BBC Woman’s Hour, Independent, The Straits Times, BusinessGreen and Reuters. Overproduction and the exposition of bad actors featured heavily in the media, with EIA securing 29% share of voice in comparison to three other organisations.