Plastic Pollution and the Need for Responsible Plastic Consumption and Waste Management

Plastic pollution is a global anthropogenic threat to all environmental compartments. The current plastic waste management practices include recycling, composting, and incineration for energy recovery or deposition in landfills, resulting in leaks into the natural environment at each stage. Interdisciplinary research and innovation perspectives in policymaking connecting the different actors in the plastic value chain would ensure the closure of material loops, safeguard human health, reduce climate change impacts, and promote biodiversity. This short paper provides an overview of the pervasive nature of plastic waste and microplastics in the natural environment, outlining a harmonious, systematic, and collaborative approach to tackling the plastics value chain while offering a potential circularity of material flows aligned with the principles of a circular plastic economy. Finally, a case is made to incorporate sustainable, restorative, and regenerative plastics production, use, and after-use as one of the unique indicators of Sustainable Development Goal 12. Ensuring sustainable consumption and production patterns in the plastics landscape will demand the development of product standards and a holistic assessment methodology to guide the design of circular products, services, and business models.