Global Plastics Treaty Negotiators Hold Closed-Door Heads-of-Delegation Talks in Nairobi

From June 30 to July 3, 2026, senior negotiators for the UN Global Plastics Treaty held an informal in-person Heads of Delegation meeting at the UN office in Nairobi, Kenya, under the roadmap adopted after the INC-5.3 session in Geneva stalled in February. The meeting was intended to narrow textual differences ahead of a resumed formal negotiating session (INC-5.4), now expected in late 2026 or early 2027, and covered the treaty's most contentious unresolved issues, including whether the agreement should cap virgin plastic production — projected to nearly triple by 2060 without intervention — or focus solely on waste management and downstream pollution. The talks were closed to civil society observers and independent scientists, a decision that drew criticism from environmental groups and the Scientists' Coalition for an Effective Plastics Treaty, who argued that excluding outside expertise weakened the legitimacy and technical rigor of the process. Chaired under new INC head Julio Cordano of Chile, the Nairobi meeting was the first in a series of virtual Heads of Delegation sessions planned every four to six weeks through the rest of 2026. No binding decisions were reached, consistent with the meeting's informal, procedural mandate, but delegates reported incremental convergence on institutional and financing mechanisms even as the production-cap divide between the High Ambition Coalition and petrostate-aligned producer nations remained unresolved.