Ghana has become the first African country to join the WEF’s Global Plastic Action Partnership.

The West African country simultaneously launched its own National Plastic Action Partnership (NPAP), which aims to sustainably manage and reduce the country’s plastic-waste challenge, while boosting economic growth, according the WEF.

‘We are pleased to partner with the Global Plastic Action Partnership to bring together existing efforts, scale up these highly successful initiatives, and fast-track our progress towards a collective goal – to achieve zero leakage of plastic waste into our oceans and waterways,’ Ghanaian President Nana Akufo-Addo said at the launch.

The goal of the NPAP is to support ‘the country’s public, private and civil society sectors in transitioning to a circular plastics economy, which directly addresses the root cause of plastic pollution by fundamentally reshaping the way plastics are produced, used and re-used’.

In so doing, the NPAP will focus on the country’s National Plastic Management Policy (which looks at the management of plastics throughout the value chain), as well as the multi-stakeholder Waste Recovery Platform. The latter is facilitated by the UN Development Programme, and is working to create ‘a one-stop shop solution platform for stakeholders to exchange data, solutions, and technological innovations on waste recovery’.

15 October 2019
Image: Alamy