NAIROBI - Representatives from 175 nations meet in Nairobi from Monday to negotiate for the first time what concrete measures should be included in a binding global treaty to end plastic pollution.
Nations agreed last year to finalise by 2024 a world-first UN treaty to address the scourge of plastics found everywhere from mountain tops to ocean depths, and within human blood and breast milk.
Negotiators have met twice already but Nairobi is the first opportunity to debate a draft treaty published in September that outlines the many pathways to tackling the plastic problem.
The material made from fossil fuels is pervasive in the modern world, sparking growing alarm in recent years.
The meeting to debate its future comes just before crucial climate talks in the oil-rich United Arab Emirates later this month, where discussions over fossil fuels and their planet-heating emissions are due to dominate the agenda.
While there is broad consensus a plastics treaty is needed, there are very different opinions about what should be in it.
"That's the big battle we will see now," said Eirik Lindebjerg from the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), who will be among thousands of attendees at the high-stakes talks at the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) global headquarters in Nairobi.
A number of countries and environment groups want the treaty to ban single-use products and impose strict rules limiting how much new plastic can actually be made, among other so-called "high ambition" measures.
Industry bodies and major plastic-producing economies have been advocating for years for measures that focus on improving waste management and reusing and recycling their products, rather than addressing their origin.
The "zero draft" underpinning the weeklong talks puts all options on the table and negotiations are expected to get heated as competing positions finally go head-to-head.
The treaty could be a pact for nature or "a cosy accommodation with the plastic industry" depending what direction the negotiations take, Peter Thomson, the UN secretary-general's special envoy for the ocean, said last month.