Shutting Off The Plastic Tap: A Global Treaty To Regulate Petrochemical Pollution? with Jane Muncke
The Great Simplification with Nate Hagens
Nate Hagens
4.8 • 552 Ratings
🗓️ 8 December 2024
⏱️ 47 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
(Conversation recorded on December 2nd, 2024)
One of the central ecological challenges of our time is addressing the plastic and petrochemical pollution that has exploded over the past several decades. This global issue will require the cooperation of all nations. But based on the disintegration of UN negotiations for a treaty on plastic pollution last Sunday, this is easier said than done.
In this special episode, Nate is joined by toxicologist Jane Muncke, who provides an in-depth analysis following the final day of discussions in Busan, South Korea. Together, they explore the complex intergovernmental negotiations that have defined the treaty process, as well as the environmental and health policies that have shaped these conversations in recent years.
Will we ever be able to place chemical safety and public health above economic motivations at the global level? Could increased public awareness of the way these seemingly convenient products affect our health and well-being finally shut off the plastic tap? Finally, is it possible for the treaty to go beyond waste management and recycling, to instead move towards reducing the production and consumption of plastics at the source?
About Jane Muncke:
Jane Muncke holds a doctorate degree in environmental toxicology and a MSc in environmental science from the ETH Zurich. Since 2012 she has been working as Managing Director and Chief Scientific Officer at the charitable Food Packaging Forum Foundation (FPF) in Zurich, Switzerland. FPF is a research and science communication organization focusing on chemicals in all types of food contact materials.
Jane Muncke is a full scientific member of the Society of Toxicology (SOT), the Society for Environmental Chemistry and Toxicology (SETAC), the American Chemical Society (ACS) and the Endocrine Society. Since 2019, she has been an elected expert member of the Swiss Organic Farming Association Bio Suisse's committee on trade and processing where she contributes to further developing the standards for processing and packaging of organic food. She is a director of the FAN initiative, a collective of experts warning about resource overshoot, the polycrisis, and related societal collapse.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Our society is addicted to plastic. |
| 0:02.6 | And one of the things about addiction is you can only do something about it when you become aware that you are addicted. |
| 0:09.8 | I don't think our society is aware of that yet. |
| 0:15.4 | You're listening to The Great Simplification. |
| 0:18.5 | I'm Nate Higgins. |
| 0:19.7 | On this show, we describe how energy, the economy, |
| 0:23.2 | the environment, and human behavior all fit together and what it might mean for our future. |
| 0:28.1 | By sharing insights from global thinkers, we hope to inform and inspire more humans to play |
| 0:34.6 | emergent roles in the coming great simplification. |
| 0:42.0 | We've had many episodes on plastic pollution. In the past, we had Sean Aswan talk about sperm |
| 0:49.2 | count, Martin Scherringer, on Pfeas, Jane Mer, and Sean Sutherland on industrial plastics in our food |
| 0:56.1 | system. In three days' time, we will have Jeremy Grantham back to talk about population |
| 1:02.7 | decline and the influence from endocrine disrupting chemicals. And in January, Shauna Swan will |
| 1:08.6 | also be back to discuss new research and some hopeful progress on removing household products and changing behaviors with plastic pollution. |
| 1:18.4 | But for now, last night at 9 p.m., I got a series of texts from my colleague Jane Munker, who was in South Korea for the UN negotiations on a global treaty |
| 1:29.8 | on plastic pollution. And she was quite upset at what had transpired since she's a friend |
| 1:36.0 | and a scientist and I have a podcast. I asked her to do a late night recording on what transpired. |
| 1:42.8 | And here that is. |
| 1:49.6 | Jane, who is normally based in Switzerland, has been an independent scientist, part of the Scientist Coalition for these discussions. |
| 1:52.8 | She holds a doctorate degree in environmental toxicology and has been working as the |
| 1:57.4 | managing director and chief scientific officer at the charitable food |
| 2:01.6 | packaging forum foundation since 2012. Please welcome this special episode with Dr. Jane Munker. |
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