Deep beneath the northern Pacific Ocean lies a remote chain of more than 800 seamounts. These oases of life, known as the Emperor Seamounts, are home to a rich variety of cold-water corals and sponges, as well as smaller creatures like crustaceans and sea stars. 

Like many other seamounts, they play a crucial role in the migration and life cycle of larger marine animals like blue, sperm, and humpback whales. Even birds, including the world’s oldest known wild bird—a Laysan albatross known as Wisdom—forage in this biodiversity hotspot. 

There are many reasons why ocean life around the Emperor Seamounts is thriving. Rising more than 100m above the surrounding seafloor, the seamounts are flooded with a constant food supply from ocean currents. The food attracts small fish, which in turn attract larger predators, like tuna and sharks. A mix of hard and soft surfaces, ledges and depressions also provide a variety of habitats for marine life to flourish. 

The United States has protected the southernmost part of the Emperor Seamounts located in its national waters, the Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument. Papahānaumokuākea and the wider ocean area beyond hold a deep cosmological and traditional significance for living Native Hawaiian culture. It’s an ancestral environment and embodiment of the Hawaiian concept of kinship between people and the natural world.

Unfortunately, the rest of the Emperor Seamounts on the high seas remain open to destructive human fishing activities. Although bottom fishing accounts for only 2.1% of all apparent fishing activity in the area, it has already devastated many vulnerable and slow-growing deep-sea ecosystems.

Regional fisheries management organisations (RFMOs) are international bodies made up of countries that share an interest in managing fishing in a particular area.   The RFMO responsible for managing fishing around the Emperor Seamounts is the North Pacific Fisheries Commission (NPFC). Since its establishment in 2015, the NPFC’s measures to safeguard the Emperor Seamounts have proved inadequate.  At the most recent NPFC meeting in April 2024, governments tried and again failed to stop bottom fishing to protect precious marine life.

The science is clear – the Emperor Seamounts need urgent protection, but every fishing season, they are harmed because of RFMO’s failure. Failing to protect them is yet another example of why we need the historic Global Ocean Treaty, which gives governments the tools to create ocean sanctuaries around our most precious ecosystems on the high seas. 

However, the Treaty can only enter into force once at least 60 governments have written it into their national laws. If governments are serious about protecting at least 30% of the ocean by 2030, they must urgently ratify the Treaty. At the same time, they must start developing proposals to fully protect vulnerable marine ecosystems like the Emperor Seamounts. At present, the first and most immediate step governments serious about ocean protection can take towards protecting this area is to stop bottom fishing.

Protect the Oceans

Add your name to call on leaders to create new ocean sanctuaries and protect our blue planet.

Add your name

Jeanette Meyer is the Global Digital Campaigner for the Protect the Oceans Campaign with Greenpeace International.

Ottawa, Canada – A global treaty that cuts plastic production and ends single-use plastic pollution is still within reach and governments have a duty to do all they can to secure it, said Greenpeace International and The Descendants Project at a press conference today. Campaigners and activists from impacted communities said Member States must ensure the fourth Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee (INC-4) meeting in Ottawa this week secures an ambitious Global Plastics Treaty that reduces plastic production and ends single-use plastics.  

Greenpeace International demands that at INC-4 Member States:

• Ensure that an option for a global target to reduce primary plastic polymer production is retained in the text. There is a risk that as we begin serious negotiations on text that ambitious countries will concede to bad-faith countries in this area.
• Ensure that targets for reduction, reuse, and refill are retained as an option in the text.
• Given the slow progress so far, Member States must move into actual negotiation of the treaty text. A first step will be states working to consolidate the many options in the revised Zero Draft, and we are expecting states to submit in-session documents like conference room papers (CRPs) with concrete proposals.
• Ensure that there is a mandate to create the first draft of the treaty text, which was one of the failures of INC-3 held last November 2023 in Nairobi, Kenya.

Highlighting the role of Canada as the host country for this round of talks, Sarah King, Head of Oceans and Plastics Campaigns for Greenpeace Canada, said:

“As host country, Canada can show leadership by setting the right tone for the talks ahead and working with other high ambition countries to champion the strongest possible measures. Public calls for bold action are getting louder, and this is Canada’s moment to heed those calls and help move us towards the impactful Plastics Treaty outcome people and the planet desperately need.”

Jo Banner of The Descendants Project, said: 

“As a resident of Louisiana’s Cancer Alley, I experience first-hand the devastating impact plastic production has on the health and environment of Frontline communities.  A treaty failing to limit plastic production is a continuation of our country’s deadly tradition, which harkens back to the days of the enslavement of my ancestors, of enriching others through the sacrificing of Black bodies, other people of color, and low-income communities.”

Earlier this month, a Greenpeace International poll report revealed that 8 out of 10 people support cutting plastic production. The survey which was conducted across 19 countries also indicates overwhelming public backing for measures aimed at ending single-use plastics and promoting reuse-based solutions.

Marian Ledesma, Zero Waste Campaigner for Greenpeace Southeast Asia – Philippines, said:

“People want a livable planet free of plastic pollution—and that’s what the Global Plastics treaty needs to deliver.  As plastic production rises, the impacts across the plastic lifecycle on our health, environment, and climate intensify, disproportionately affecting the most vulnerable groups and the Global South. Our recent Greenpeace International poll shows that people—particularly in the Philippines and Global South—recognize what’s at stake. To maintain a livable planet and an equitable future for all, the treaty must cut plastic production by 75% by 2040 and transition to a reuse-based economy.”

ENDS

Notes: 

Greenpeace demands for a Global Plastics Treaty

Photos and videos can be accessed from the Greenpeace Media Library. 

Contacts:

Angelica Carballo Pago, Global Plastics Campaign Media Lead, Greenpeace USA, angelica.pago@greenpeace.org , +63 917 1124492 (also in Ottawa, Canada)

Greenpeace International Press Desk, +31 (0)20 718 2470 (available 24 hours), pressdesk.int@greenpeace.org

Follow @greenpeacepress on Twitter for our latest international press releases

Plastic pollution has managed to invade even the most remote areas of our environment and has also been reported in several tissues of the human body. Plastic production levels have exploded since the 1950s and continue to rise. The problem is so pervasive and daunting that we sometimes find ourselves placing a little too much hope in solutions that aren’t really solutions at all.

As is often the case, industry and the major polluters (big brands, fossil fuel and petrochemical companies) are lying in wait to promote false solutions that allow them to continue business as usual and continue to make indecent profits and pollute with impunity while continuing to deny their responsibility. From recycling to bioplastics, here are 4 examples of approaches that fail to tackle the scale of the global plastic pollution crisis.

1. Recycling

Recycling has long been heralded as a solution to reduce plastic waste. Especially by corporations like Coca-Cola, PepsiCo, Nestlé, and Unilever, and industry front groups who promote plastic recycling as the solution to plastic waste for decades.

However, the reality is far from ideal. Globally, only 9% of plastic gets recycled. The rest is burned, buried, or ends up in the environment, including at sea. Even in the most advanced countries in this field, the recycling rate for plastics collected by households is often far less than 50%, with very little of that converted back into packaging. Additionally, the quality of recycled plastic is often inferior, making it less desirable for manufacturers. Relying on recycling perpetuates the linear “take-make-dispose” model of consumption, rather than addressing the root cause of overproduction and consumption of plastic.

Chemical recycling, touted as a revolutionary solution by industry representatives – such as PlasticsEurope, the European lobby for plastics producers here, involves breaking down plastic into its molecular components to create new materials. But the process is energy-intensive and relies on complex chemical reactions, raising concerns about environmental impact and scalability. Moreover, chemical recycling still produces by-products and emissions, contributing to pollution in different forms.

Mechanical and chemical recycling of plastic waste fails because plastic waste is extremely difficult to collect, virtually impossible to sort for recycling, environmentally harmful to reprocess, often made of and contaminated by toxic materials, and not economical to recycle.

2. Clean-up initiatives

Beach clean-ups and river sweeps are commendable efforts to remove plastic waste from the environment. The most famous initiative of this type is undoubtedly The Ocean Cleanup, a nonprofit organisation founded by Boyan Slat, with the mission of developing advanced technologies to rid the world’s oceans of plastic pollution thanks to passive ocean cleanup systems, which utilise natural oceanic forces such as currents and wind to capture and concentrate plastic debris. The project’s history is littered with failures, and it is regularly criticised.

Seeing the results of clean-up operations is always gratifying and heart-warming. Greenpeace organisations and the people who work or volunteer for them support and take part in clean-up initiatives in different parts of the world.

However, these initiatives – including The Ocean Cleanup and the millions of dollars raised by the organisation – are akin to mopping the floor while the tap is still running. They address the symptoms of plastic pollution but do little to prevent its continuous influx into ecosystems. Without upstream interventions to curb plastic production and consumption, clean-up efforts will remain a perpetual cycle, unable to keep pace with the sheer volume of plastic entering the environment.

These initiatives can be very useful when they make it possible to identify the most common sources of plastic pollution and which companies are the biggest contributors to plastic pollution. Indeed in this case the goal is precisely to hold companies accountable for the plastic waste generated by their products and packaging and push for systemic change.

3. Bioplastics

Bioplastics are defined as plastic materials that are either partly or wholly derived from renewable biomass like plants or are biodegradable or are both. Biodegradable plastics seem like a promising solution to the plastic pollution problem but they’re not a silver bullet. 

While these plastics can break down into smaller pieces over time, they often require specific conditions to do so, such as high temperatures and certain microbes that are not readily available in most environments. Researchers find many “biodegradable” plastics end up in landfills or oceans, where they persist for years without degrading significantly. According to studies, they can create a lot of nano- and micro-plastics.

Moreover, the production of biodegradable plastics can still rely on fossil fuels. Bioplastics use should not put food security (or food sovereignty) at risk: in other words, land being used to grow or source material for bio-plastics should not compete with land needed for producing food and feeding local communities. The social and ecological footprint of bioplastics is not neutral.

In the context of waste prevention and recycling, proposing to replace fossil-based plastics with bio-based equivalents risks distracting from and delaying real source reduction solutions by promoting the production of plastic from other sources rather than reducing use of plastics. Ultimately, bioplastics replace a single-use petroleum-based plastic with another single-use bioplastic product. The only solution to our disposable culture is a large-scale transition to a reuse and refill economy.

4. Plastic-eating bacteria

Yes, you read that right. The discovery of plastic-eating bacteria by Japanese scientists in 2001 sparked hope for a natural solution to plastic pollution. Judging by the many articles and posts on the subject that regularly go viral on social networks, this is still the case.

However, deploying these microbes in the environment poses significant risks. Introducing those that have been genetically modified into ecosystems could have unforeseen consequences, disrupting delicate ecological balances. Moreover, the efficacy of these bacteria in degrading plastic on a large scale remains uncertain. While plastic-eating bacteria have shown promising results in the highly restricted and specific environment of the scientific laboratory, extending the process to industrial scale is a completely different story (which may remind you of other false solutions, such as carbon capture and storage or nuclear fusion).

Finally, relying on biological agents to clean up our mess is once again akin to treating symptoms rather than addressing the underlying problem of excessive plastic usage.

Recycling, clean-ups, bioplastics, or plastic-eating bacteria all have limitations and drawbacks that underscore the need for a paradigm shift. What people and the planet urgently need is a global Plastics Treaty that tackles plastic pollution at its source by drastically reducing production and massively enabling reuse and refill systems. 

Eight out of 10 people support cutting plastic production. Governments must listen to them.

Let’s end the age of plastic!

Ask world leaders to support a strong global plastic treaty that addresses the whole life cycle of plastic.

Take action