The Trudeau Liberal government has announced it will require producers to detail each piece of plastic it puts on the market into a Federal Plastics Registry. The announcement comes on Earth Day, themed Planet vs. Plastics this year, to raise awareness of plastic pollution. Environment and Climate Change Minister Steven Guilbeault in a news release Monday asserted this is a “practical tool” that will “compel” those in the plastics industry “take more responsibility” with the amount of plastic it outputs. The new rules require plastic producers to document the quantity and type of plastic they put on the Canadian market, including packaging for single-use and disposable products, construction and industry materials, electronics and transportation, and report to the federal government annually. The registry will track plastics in the country, measure pollution reduction, and help inform future climate-related decisions, the environment minister said in the news release. Guilbeault laments less than 10% of plastics in Canada are recycled, and everything else ends up in landfills or polluting natural landscapes and waters. .The registry will also monitor and “improve” how plastics are made, used and managed, cut plastic waste, provide green economic opportunities, and “send a clear signal to governments and businesses so they can spur innovation, drive policy, and signal areas of investment,” wrote Guilbeault. He described it as a “tool to compel plastic producers and other companies across the plastics value chain to help monitor and track plastic from the time it is produced up to its end of life.”Speaking at Partnerships Day Ottawa, a peripheral event to the United Nations' Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee summit, Guilbeault said “the registry will require plastic producers to take more responsibility for the plastic they put on the market.”“Every year from now on they must declare the quantity and types of plastic they supply, how these plastics move through the economy, and how they are managed at the end of their life,” said Guilbeault. This week’s summit is “to advance the development of a global agreement on plastic pollution by the end of 2024,” according to CPAC.Canada is hosting the week-long event, with UN delegates from over 175 countries travelling to Ottawa to attend the April 23 to 29 summit.
