Back to Blue, an ocean health initiative of Economist Impact and The Nippon Foundation, has released a report introducing the Plastics Management Index (PMI). Plastics Management Index: Evaluating effective management and sustainable use of plastics is based on two global surveys and an index that ranks 25 countries across 44 indicators across three pillars (governance, systemic capacity and stakeholder engagement).
Political Ecology Research Centre Co-Director Dr. Trisia Farrelly has made a significant contribution to the report (pages 23-28).
The report argues that the scale of the plastic pollution challenge demands a new framework that covers the entire lifecycle of plastic products—from design to production to consumption to disposal and beyond. This report aims to contribute to this goal by bringing attention to growing global concerns around the use of plastic and highlighting how its management can be made sustainable.
The PMI measures, compares and contrasts the efforts made by a selection of 25 countries at different stages of development in their management of plastics, covering the entire lifecycle of plastic products.
The report can be accessed here: https://backtoblueinitiative.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/Plastics-Management-Index-Whitepaper_sep29.pdf