European banks to sink $6.3 billion in protecting oceans from plastic

London: A group of European development banks plan to double its funding for global efforts to stop plastic waste from polluting the world’s oceans to €4 billion ($6.3 billion).

The Clean Oceans Initiative, led by the French and German development banks and the European Investment Bank is the largest such grouping targeting plastic pollution of the sea.

Around 8 million tonnes of plastic waste enters the oceans every year, most of it discarded on land or washed into rivers, the group said, threatening the marine environment and communities that rely on the sea for their livelihood.

Plastic and other debris on the beach on Midway Atoll in the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands. Credit:AP

The new target for 2025 builds on an initial funding goal of €2 billion by 2023, 80 per cent of which has already been allocated to projects in countries including Sri Lanka, China, Egypt that will benefit more than 20 million people, the group said.

“The oceans are under severe pressure: they are polluted, littered, overfished, their species richness is massively compromised,” Stefan Wintels, chief executive of German development bank KfW, said.

Earlier this week a review of more than 2590 studies commissioned by the environmental group WWF said that by the end of the century, marine areas more than 2½ times the size of Greenland could exceed ecologically dangerous thresholds of microplastic concentration.

American officials remove mooring line and a buoy from a young humpback whale off Ukumehame, Maui, in January.Credit:NOAA/AP

This is based on projections that plastic production is expected to more than double by 2040 resulting in plastic debris in the ocean quadrupling by 2050, the WWF report said.

The €1.6 billion already allocated by the group to tackle the issue took the form of long-term financing for projects that limit the discharge of plastics, micro-plastics and other litter through better management of waste, wastewater and storm water.

Improving management in developing countries, home to some of the fastest-growing and most densely populated cities, would help stop some of the 1.5 million tonnes of micro-plastics that end up in the sea every year, it said.

Led by France’s Agence Française de Developpement (AFD), KfW and the EIB, the group also includes Italy’s Cassa Depositi e Prestiti (CDP), Spain’s national promotional bank ICO and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development.

Reuters

Most Viewed in World

From our partners

Source: Read Full Article