Ahead of INC-5.2, Azul Releases Plastic Policy Proposal Centering Community-driven Solutions to Combat the Plastics Crisis
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Ahead of INC-5.2, Azul Releases Plastic Policy Proposal Centering Community-driven Solutions to Combat the Plastics Crisis
“A Just Plastic Treaty: By Communities, For Communities” promotes implementation-ready recommendations grounded in science, human rights, and environmental justice.
SAN DIEGO, CA (July 29, 2025) — Azul, an ocean justice organization working with Latino communities to protect coastal and marine ecosystems, today released a policy proposal calling for community-driven policy solutions to address the adverse social and environmental impacts of plastics. Azul’s new policy proposal: A Just Plastics Treaty: By Communities, for Communities — Supply Cuts, Fair Finance, Shared Technology, Local Power, is released ahead of the second part of the fifth session of the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee to develop an international legally binding instrument on plastic pollution, including in the marine environment (INC 5.2), kicking off August 5th, 2025 in Geneva, Switzerland. The negotiations, known as INC-5.2, aim to make progress towards a global treaty on plastic pollution, including its impact on the ocean.
“As we approach the second part of the fifth session of the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee to develop an international legally binding instrument on plastic pollution, including in the marine environment, it is critical that the voices of the people who know the ocean best be included in the solutions to defend it,” said Marce Gutiérrez-Graudiņš, Founder and Executive Director of Azul. “This treaty language proposal is designed by communities, for communities to anchor ocean justice and build a truly sustainable blue economy that protects life, jobs, and cultures alike.”
Azul’s policy proposal includes specific treaty language recommendations to shape strong legal commitment; provisions to support fair financing, shared technology, local power; and recommendations to curb primary plastic polymer production at the source.
Azul has been an active presence at all rounds of negotiations leading up to INC-5.2, leveraging its binational team and advocates to support and work with Latin American delegations who are leading with ambitious proposals. This policy proposal builds on Azul’s track record of centering marginalized voices to advance ocean justice. In 2021, Azul authored the first UNEP report that identified marine litter and plastic pollution as an environmental justice issue – a groundbreaking report that demonstrated how the entire life cycle of plastics, from source extraction to waste, disproportionately affects marginalized communities.
“The recommendations in the policy proposal give us a chance to rewrite the playbook so that those living closest to the sea shape how the ocean economy grows, how plastic flows shrink, and how the promises of sustainability finally reach the shore,” Gutiérrez-Graudiņš said.
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About Azul
Azul is an ocean justice organization working with Latino communities to protect our blue planet. Founded in 2011, Azul has developed and executed campaigns that achieved groundbreaking ocean conservation policy victories at local, national, and international levels. To learn more, visit: Azul.org