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STORY: UNEP / INC-5.2 PLASTIC POLLUTION OPENING
TRT: 3:49
SOURCE: UNEP / INC
RESTRICTIONS: NONE
LANGUAGE: ENGLISH
DATELINE: 05 AUGUST 2025, GENEVA, SWITZERLAND
1.Various shots, exterior, United Nations Offices in Geneva, where INC 5.2 negotiations are taking place.
2. Various shots, installation by artist Benjamin Von Wong depicting Rodin’s “The Thinker” sculpture submerged in plastic.
3. Various shots, protests against plastic pollution outside UN Offices Geneva.
4. Various shots, musical performance and delegates in conference hall at opening of INC 5.2
5. SOUNDBITE (English) Ambassador Luis Vayas Valdivieso, INC Chair:
“Dear colleagues, dear friends, excellencies, distinguished delegates, ladies and gentlemen. It is my honor to declare open the second part of the fifth session of the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee to develop an international, legally binding instrument on plastic pollution, including the Marine environment. And I call to order this fifth plenary meeting.”
6. Wide shot, conference hall
7. SOUNDBITE (English) Ambassador Luis Vayas Valdivieso, INC Chair:
“We have come to Geneva with a shared vision to finish the work we started together and to fulfill the mandate given to us under UNEA Resolution 514. For the first time in history the world is within the reach of a legally binding international instrument to end plastic pollution.”
8. Med shot, conference hall
9. SOUNDBITE (English) Ambassador Luis Vayas Valdivieso, INC Chair.
“This moment calls for a recognition that the common good does not conflict with national interests, but instead a arises from a careful and courageous balance between them.”
10. Various shots, UNEP Executive Director Inger Andersen walks on stage. Cutaway of delegates.
11. SOUNDBITE (English) Inger Andersen, UN Environment Programme Executive Director:
“As you get down to negotiating, I remind you that - which you know - that the world wants you to succeed. The world wants and needs to tackle plastic pollution crisis. People are frankly outraged by the plastic in their environment. They're worried they're watching, and rightly so. Plastic pollution is already in nature, and our oceans and in our bloodstreams, and the plastic leakage to the environment is predicted to grow. And if we continue as we are right now, then we will see plastic pollution growing even more, with significant consequences for the environment, for the economy as yet, indeed for human health.”
12. Various shots, Inger Andersen Speaking
13. SOUNDBITE (English) Inger Andersen, UN Environment Programme Executive Director:
“I ask you to reach across the aisle and start crafting the chair’s text into that final agreement, one that draws on the many areas of convergence, one that starts with real strength, but also includes the hooks for future developments, and one that sets the world on a path to end plastic pollution forever.”
14. Wide shot, conference hall
The second part of the fifth session of the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee (INC-5.2) on plastic pollution opens in Geneva Switzerland today (05 Aug) . This pivotal gathering aims to finalize an international legally binding instrument addressing plastic pollution, including in the marine environment.
Speaking at the opening of the conference, Chair of the INC Ambassador Luis Vayas Valdivieso, “It is my honor to declare open the second part of the fifth session of the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee to develop an international, legally binding instrument on plastic pollution, including the Marine environment. And I call to order this fifth plenary meeting.”
Ambassador Luis Vayas Valdivieso also said, “We have come to Geneva with a shared vision to finish the work we started together and to fulfill the mandate given to us under UNEA Resolution 514.”
“For the first time in history the world is within the reach of a legally binding international instrument to end plastic pollution,” he added.
Ambassador Valdivieso reiterated, “This moment calls for a recognition that the common good does not conflict with national interests, but instead a arises from a careful and courageous balance between them.”
For her part, UNEP Executive Director Inger Andersen said, “As you get down to negotiating, I remind you that - which you know - that the world wants you to succeed. The world wants and needs to tackle the plastic pollution crisis.”
“People are frankly outraged by the plastic in their environment. They're worried they're watching, and rightly so,” she added.
The UNEP Executive Director continued, “Plastic pollution is already in nature, and our oceans and in our bloodstreams, and the plastic leakage to the environment is predicted to grow. And if we continue as we are right now, then we will see plastic pollution growing even more, with significant consequences for the environment, for the economy as yet, indeed for human health.”
Andersen concluded, “I ask you to reach across the aisle and start crafting the chair’s text into that final agreement, one that draws on the many areas of convergence, one that starts with real strength, but also includes the hooks for future developments, and one that sets the world on a path to end plastic pollution forever.”
