To tackle plastic scourge, Philippines makes companies pay

To tackle plastic scourge, Philippines makes companies pay
The Philippines is the first in Southeast Asia to impose penalties on companies over plastic waste. It does not however ban any plastics, including the popular but difficult to recover and recycle single-use sachets. (AFP)
Short Url
Updated 31 October 2024
Follow

To tackle plastic scourge, Philippines makes companies pay

To tackle plastic scourge, Philippines makes companies pay
  • The Philippines generates some 1.7 million metric tonnes of post-consumer plastic waste a year
  • New law intends to achieve ‘plastic neutrality’ by forcing large businesses to reduce plastic pollution through product design

MANILA: Long one of the world’s top sources of ocean plastic, the Philippines is hoping new legislation requiring big companies to pay for waste solutions will help clean up its act.
Last year, its “Extended Producer Responsibility” statute came into force — the first in Southeast Asia to impose penalties on companies over plastic waste.
The experiment has shown both the promise and the pitfalls of the tool, which could be among the measures in a treaty to tackle plastic pollution that countries hope to agree this year.
The Philippines, with a population of 120 million, generates some 1.7 million metric tonnes of post-consumer plastic waste a year, according to the World Bank.
Of that, a third goes to landfills and dumpsites, with 35 percent discarded on open land.
The EPR law is intended to achieve “plastic neutrality” by forcing large businesses to reduce plastic pollution through product design and removing waste from the environment.
They are obliged to cover an initial 20 percent of their plastic packaging footprint, calculated based on the weight of plastic packaging they put into the market.
The obligation will rise to a ceiling of 80 percent by 2028.
The law covers a broad range of plastics, including flexible types that are commercially unviable for recycling and thus often go uncollected.
It does not however ban any plastics, including the popular but difficult to recover and recycle single-use sachets common in the Philippines.
So far, around half the eligible companies under the law have launched EPR programs.
Over a thousand more must do so by end-December or face fines of up to 20 million pesos ($343,000) and even revocation of their operating licenses.
The law removed 486,000 tonnes of plastic waste from the environment last year, Environment Undersecretary Jonas Leones said.
That topped the 2023 target and is “part of a broader strategy to reduce the environmental impact of plastic pollution, particularly given the Philippines’ status as one of the largest contributors to marine plastic waste globally.”
The law allows companies to outsource their obligations to “producer responsibility organizations,” many of which use a mechanism called plastic credits.
These allow companies to buy a certificate that a metric ton of plastic has been removed from the environment and either recycled, upcycled or “co-processed” — burned for energy.
PCX Solutions, one of the country’s biggest players, offers local credits priced around $100 for collection and co-processing of mixed plastics to over $500 for collection and recycling of ocean-bound PET plastic.
The model is intended to channel money into the underfunded waste collection sector and encourage collection of plastic that is commercially unviable for recycling.
“It’s manna from heaven,” former streetsweeper Marita Blanco said.
A widowed mother-of-five, Blanco lives in Manila’s low-income San Andres district and buys plastic bottles, styrofoam and candy wrappers for two pesos (3.4 US cents) a kilogramme (2.2 pounds).
She then sells them at a 25 percent mark-up to US charity Friends of Hope, which works with PCX Solutions to process them.
“I didn’t know that there was money in garbage,” she said.
“If I do not look down on the task of picking up garbage, my financial situation will improve.”
Friends of Hope managing director Ilusion Farias said the project was making a visible difference to an area often strewn with discarded plastic.
“Two years ago, I think you would have seen a lot dirtier street,” she said.
“Behavioral change is really slow, and it takes a really long time.”
Among those purchasing credits is snack producer Mondelez, which has opted to jump directly to “offsetting” 100 percent of its plastic footprint.
“It costs company budgets... but that’s really something that we just said we would commit to do for the environment,” Mondelez Philippines corporate and government affairs official Caitlin Punzalan said.
But while companies have lined up to buy plastic credits, there has been less movement on stemming the flow of new plastic, including through redesign.
“Upstream reduction is not really easy,” said PCX Solutions managing director Stefanie Beitien.
“There is no procurement department in the world that accepts a 20 percent higher packaging price just because it’s the right thing to do.”
And while PCX credits cannot be claimed against plastic that is landfilled, they do allow for waste to be burned, with the ash then used for cement.
“It’s still linear, not circular, because you’re destroying the plastic and you’re still generating virgin plastic,” acknowledged Leones of the environment ministry.
Still, the law remains a “very strong policy,” according to Floradema Eleazar, an official with the UN Development Programme.
But “we will not see immediate impacts right now, or tomorrow,” she said.
“It would require really massive behavioral change for everyone to make sure that this happens.”


UK minister defends 2013 vote against Syria military action

UK minister defends 2013 vote against Syria military action
Updated 13 December 2024
Follow

UK minister defends 2013 vote against Syria military action

UK minister defends 2013 vote against Syria military action
  • Downfall of Bashar Assad reawakens debate over Western inaction
  • Britain’s decision not to intervene derailed Obama’s chemical weapons ‘red line’ response

LONDON: The former leader of the UK’s Labour Party has defended his 2013 decision not to support the government in taking military action against Bashar Assad in Syria.

The British Parliament voted against attacking Syrian government targets after it used chemical weapons against a rebel-held Damascus suburb.

Labour were in opposition at the time and its MPs were directed by Ed Miliband not to support Prime Minister David Cameron’s motion in favor of striking Assad.

The UK vote derailed the US military’s response to the use of chemical weapons in Syria — something President Barack Obama had declared a “red line.”

Without the support of its main Western ally, Washington held back. Many observers believe the decision emboldened Assad and opened the way for Russia to enter the conflict in support of his government.

The downfall of Assad last weekend has reawakened the debate over whether the UK should have taken action, with Labour cabinet ministers openly disagreeing over the course taken more than 10 years ago.

On Thursday, Health Secretary Wes Streeting, who was not an MP at the time, told a BBC politics TV show that “if the West had acted faster, Assad would have been gone.”

He added: “The hesitation of this country and the US created a vacuum that Russia moved into and kept Assad in power for much longer.”

Miliband, who is now energy secretary, said on Friday that his cabinet colleague was wrong.

Miliband said the decision not to support military strikes against Assad was grounded in the lessons learned from the 2003 Iraq invasion.

“The decision I was confronted with in 2013 was whether we did a bombing of President Assad without any clear plan for British military engagement, where it would lead and what it would mean,” Miliband told Times Radio.

“And I believe then, and I do now, that one of the most important lessons of the Iraq War is we shouldn’t go into military intervention without a clear plan, including an exit strategy.”

Miliband said that when President Donald Trump ordered bombing raids on Syria in 2017 in response to another chemical weapons attack, it did not lead to the downfall of Assad.

“So when people say that somehow if we bombed President Assad in 2013 he would have toppled over, frankly, it’s just wrong,” he said.

The fall of the Assad government after a lightning offensive by opposition militants has further revealed the extent of the suffering in Syria under his rule, leading to soul-searching in capitals around the world.

The Syrian War, which started in 2011 as anti-government protests, killed hundreds of thousands of people and displaced more than 13 million.


Somalia, Ethiopia urged to swiftly implement agreement

Somalia, Ethiopia urged to swiftly implement agreement
Updated 13 December 2024
Follow

Somalia, Ethiopia urged to swiftly implement agreement

Somalia, Ethiopia urged to swiftly implement agreement
  • Mogadishu and Addis Ababa have been at loggerheads over Somaliland region

ADDIS ABABA: The African Union has urged Ethiopia and Somalia to implement “without delay” an agreement aimed at ending tensions between the neighbors over Ethiopia’s access to the sea, calling the deal an “important act.”

The two countries have been at loggerheads since landlocked Ethiopia struck a deal in January with Somalia’s breakaway region Somaliland to lease a stretch of coastline for a port and military base.

In return, Somaliland — which declared independence from Somalia in 1991 in a move not recognized by Mogadishu — said Ethiopia would give it formal recognition, although this was never confirmed by Addis Ababa.

Somalia branded the deal a violation of its sovereignty, setting international alarm bells ringing over the risk of renewed conflict in the volatile region.

Following hours of Turkish-brokered talks, Ankara announced late Wednesday that an “historic” agreement had been reached between Somalia and Ethiopia.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said he believed the agreement would help Ethiopia gain its long-desired access to the sea. Technical talks are set for next year.

Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed and Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud had flown into Ankara for the talks following two previous rounds that made little progress.

Speaking in the Turkish capital after the agreement, Mohamud said the neighbors had “mutual interests in cooperating together.”

“We belong to a region where peace and stability is first priority for our people’s lives,” he said.

African Union Commission Chairman Moussa Faki Mahamat stressed the “important act” taken by the leaders to find a deal but emphasized the urgency to “implement, without delay, the relevant measures adopted.”

He did not give any indication in the statement, posted on social media platform X, of what measures had been agreed.

East Africa’s regional bloc IGAD (the Intergovernmental Authority on Development) also welcomed the agreement as an “important step.”

It “demonstrates a commitment to resolving bilateral
issues amicably,” IGAD Executive Secretary Workneh Gebeyehu said.

According to the text of the accord published by Turkiye, the parties agreed “to put aside differences of opinion and contentious issues, and to move resolutely forward in cooperation toward common prosperity.”

They agreed to work closely together on commercial arrangements and bilateral agreements that would ensure Ethiopia’s “reliable, safe and sustainable access” to the sea “under the sovereign authority of the Federal Republic of Somalia.”

To that end, it said they would start technical talks no later than the end of February which would be completed “within four months,” with any differences to be dealt with “through dialogue, where necessary with Turkiye’s support.”

Both top US diplomat Antony Blinken and UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, in separate statements, looked ahead to negotiations to finalize the accord.

Blinken said the agreement reaffirms “each country’s sovereignty, unity, independence, and territorial integrity.”

Guterres thanked Erdogan for his role and looked forward to “a positive outcome to the process,” his spokesman Stephane Dujarric said.

There was no detail in the text published by Turkiye on how the agreement might impact the controversial memorandum of understanding between Somaliland and Ethiopia, which has never been made public.

Ethiopian authorities did not immediately respond to AFP’s requests for comment about the future of the agreement with Somaliland.

A source close to the Somaliland government said nothing had changed regarding the agreement with Ethiopia, noting: “Agreeing to work together to resolve their dispute is not the same as walking away from the MOU.”

While Abiy has repeatedly insisted that his country must have coastal access, he told parliament earlier this year that Ethiopia had “no interest in getting involved in a war” over access to the sea.

In response, Mogadishu has strengthened its ties with Egypt, Ethiopia’s longtime rival.

Somalia expelled Ethiopia’s ambassador in April and said Ethiopian troops would be excluded from a new African Union peacekeeping force against Islamist Al-Shabab insurgents that is due to be deployed on January 1.


Unidentified drones spotted over German military, industrial sites

Unidentified drones spotted over German military, industrial sites
Updated 13 December 2024
Follow

Unidentified drones spotted over German military, industrial sites

Unidentified drones spotted over German military, industrial sites
  • Police did not say who they thought had launched the unmanned aerial vehicles.
  • “In recent days, several drone flights have been detected over critical infrastructure in Rhineland-Palatinate state,” a regional police spokesman said

BERLIN: German authorities said Friday that unidentified drones had been spotted flying over sensitive military and industrial sites including the US Ramstein air base.
The reports come after German officials have repeatedly voiced alarm about the threat of Russian spying as the Ukraine war heightens tensions between Moscow and NATO.
However, police did not say who they thought had launched the unmanned aerial vehicles.
“In recent days, several drone flights have been detected over critical infrastructure in Rhineland-Palatinate state,” a regional police spokesman told AFP.
The UAVs were first sighted at German company BASF’s plant in Ludwigshafen, known as the world’s biggest chemicals complex, the spokesman said.
“This was followed in the course of this week by drone overflights over the US air base in Ramstein,” he added.
The drones were detected at dusk and were “larger than the usual commercial hobby drones,” the spokesman said.
Police in Rhineland-Palatinate have set up a special investigative unit to look into the incidents.
There is “no concrete danger to the facilities concerned,” the spokesman said.
The sightings in Ramstein were on December 3 and 4, according to Der Spiegel magazine.
Unidentified drones have also been sighted over facilities belonging to German arms maker Rheinmetall, Der Spiegel reported, citing security services.
A source with knowledge of the matter confirmed to AFP that suspicious drones had been spotted near Rheinmetall’s largest ammunition production site at Unterluess, Lower Saxony.
Unidentified drones were also reported in August over the Bruensbuettel industrial area in the northern state of Schleswig-Holstein.
Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock at the time said the devices were surely “not there to observe the beautiful local landscape, but because there is a chemical park there and a... storage facility for nuclear waste nearby.”
Media reports said officials believed those drones were Russian reconnaissance devices.
However, investigations into the Bruensbuettel sightings have so far shown no indications of espionage, according to a report from the ARD broadcaster on Friday.
German officials have repeatedly raised the alarm in recent months about Russian spying and “hybrid warfare,” including acts of sabotage and disinformation in the campaign toward February general elections.


Top Indian actor arrested after death of fan at film premiere

Top Indian actor arrested after death of fan at film premiere
Updated 13 December 2024
Follow

Top Indian actor arrested after death of fan at film premiere

Top Indian actor arrested after death of fan at film premiere
  • Allu Arjun appeared at the film premiere in the Indian city of Hyderabad on December 4
  • As fans clamoured to meet him, a 39-year-old woman died and her son was critically injured

HYDERABAD: A top movie actor in southern India was arrested on Friday, a week after a woman died and her son was seriously injured in the crush of fans that his surprise appearance at the premiere of his film provoked, police said.
Allu Arjun, prominent in the Telugu film industry, based in the southern states of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, where film stars are revered by die-hard fans, appeared at the film premiere in Hyderabad on Dec. 4.
As fans clamoured to meet him, a 39-year-old woman died and her nine-year-old son was critically injured. Police earlier this week arrested the owner of the theater where the incident took place, and on Friday they arrested Arjun at his residence.
He was granted bail by a local court a few hours after his arrest and he was expected to be released from prison shortly, his counsel said.
Arjun, 41, was named in the initial police complaint, which alleged that his personal security detail had tried to clear the crowd near him, causing the death of the woman who had become breathless, according to a copy of the document seen by Reuters.
Arjun’s counsel has denied any wrongdoing on his part, and he has publicly apologized for the incident.
Actors in southern India, which has a thriving film industry independent of Bollywood, are larger than life figures, with fan clubs who often build temples to their idols, and bathe their posters in milk during premieres.


Ukraine’s Zelensky to meet European leaders in Brussels on Wednesday

Ukraine’s Zelensky to meet European leaders in Brussels on Wednesday
Updated 13 December 2024
Follow

Ukraine’s Zelensky to meet European leaders in Brussels on Wednesday

Ukraine’s Zelensky to meet European leaders in Brussels on Wednesday
  • Zelensky and some of his European allies have called for European troops to be deployed to Ukraine
  • “It won’t be a meeting that has concrete decisions, but more political to discuss the coming weeks and months,” said a source

BRUSSELS: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky will attend a meeting with the leaders of Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Poland, NATO and the EU in Brussels on Wednesday to discuss support for his country in its war with Russia, sources familiar with the plan told Reuters.
The meeting comes as European countries face the possibility of the US, Ukraine’s largest source of support, changing its approach to the conflict when Donald Trump returns to the White House in January.
Zelensky and some of his European allies have called for European troops to be deployed to Ukraine to act as a deterrent to further military action by Russia after any ceasefire.
“It won’t be a meeting that has concrete decisions, but more political to discuss the coming weeks and months,” said a source familiar with the meeting.
The gathering, hosted by NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte, will be held on the day leaders were already due to meet for the EU-Western Balkans summit in Brussels, and involve a joint meeting and several bilateral meetings with Zelensky.