Global talks aren’t helping climate action. Act local

In the last week of November, in the aftermath of the divisive and, many would argue, failed, UN Climate Change Conference in Baku, COP 29, representatives from countries across the world met in Busan, to discuss another planetary-scale crisis – plastic pollution. In 2023, 413.8 million metric tons of plastic were produced, with a monetary value of $712 billion.

This economic valuation, as many such valuations do, completely ignores the fact that plastic pollution presents a real and present danger to human, animal and plant life, both on land and sea, across all continents. It fails to take into account the fact that more than 90 per cent of the plastic we produce is not recycled, ending up in waste dumps and eventually making its way to the soil, rivers and oceans, and now even the clouds and in ‘fresh’ rain water.

Small wonder that microplastics have been termed by many global environmental scientists and policymakers as an existential challenge to humanity, alongside other prominent planetary crises such as climate change and biodiversity collapse. Country representatives met in Busan for a fifth round of negotiations of the Intergovernmental Negotiations Committee, hoping to hammer out the fine details of an agreement to limit global production of plastic, and mandate recycling.

The meeting was attended by 3,300 participants, including representatives from 175 countries and 440 organisations. Yet, despite the intense focus on plastic from many health organisations and the media, the talks concluded without any real progress, agreeing only to meet again to negotiate next year.

Such is the fate of global negotiations on critical issues like climate change and pollution. What about local policies? Many cities across the world have taken note of the sustainability challenges they face – polluted air and water, heat waves, floods, droughts, epidemics, and mental health challenges – and begun to deal with them through concerted plans that include ecological measures like afforestation, wetland restoration and daylighting of buried rivers and streams, improving pedestrian and cycling infrastructure, and access to open spaces and urban commons.

What does Bengaluru do? Cut trees. Relentlessly, doggedly, with determination. As if the decimation of trees across the city has not been sufficient already, the plans for Phase 3 of the Namma Metro, aim to cut down or relocate 11,137 trees to build the Orange Line. As always, promises have been made to conduct compensatory afforestation, with an environmental mitigation plan accompanied by a hefty budget of Rs 43.53 crore. But we have heard such promises before.

If all the compensatory afforestation programmes that have been promised to Bengaluru, to mitigate the impact of the loss of lakhs of trees that have been cut down across the city for road widening, flyovers, underpasses, signal-free corridors, and the Metro had been fulfilled, by now the city should have been smothered in green, instead of choking in smog.

We haven’t made much progress in recycling our waste either. Estimates indicate that about 20 per cent of Bengaluru municipality’s solid waste is made of plastic, much of which makes its way into landfills and eventually into the water we pump out from the ground using borewells, to drink and cook with. Even the single-use plastic bags that were supposed to be phased out continue to be seen across the city.

We can’t wait for global negotiations to bear fruit for a better, more sustainable future. We need to act now.