Ocean campaigners will remember 2018 as the year in which the EU became serious about addressing the plastic pollution problem. With the release of the European Plastics Strategy the Commission laid out a road-map for abolishing single-use plastics across the EU by 2030.
Now that the EU has released its plastic strategy, the Danish government has started work on a national plastics management plan for Denmark. KIMO Denmark is taking part in the consultation process and has already made a number of concrete proposals to ensure that the new strategy does, in the end, curb marine pollution.
KIMO Denmark’s coordinator Ryan Metcalfe explains:
Our ideas focus on prevention of macro and microplastics through both awareness and legislation. We are lobbying to limit single-use items generally. We’re also trying to gather support for more specific proposals such as a national ban on mass balloon releases which KIMO has long campaigned for.
KIMO is an association of municipalities. Since municipalities are involved on a daily basis with waste management, KIMO is well placed to understand which changes in policy, legislation and funding would contribute to a reduction of plastic waste. Ryan Metcalfe gives some examples:
We’re lobbying for more support to local municipalities for beach cleaning and eliminating taxes from incineration of marine litter. We also ask that the government support funding for municipal research and development of new technologies for reclaiming plastics and stopping microparticles from surface and wastewater.
As the new EU plastics strategy is rolled out across Europe, municipalities will have a huge role to play in making the strategy work on the ground. However, we need the support of our national governments, international organisations and the EU. KIMO continues to work on behalf of municipalities to secure that support.
For further detail see the full English version of KIMO Denmark’s letter to the Danish government.