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Malaysia, the Philippines, and Thailand
BOX 4.10
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Asia is responsible for over 80 percent of the world’s marine leakage, and 8 of the top 10 contributing countries are from that region—among them, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Thailand. This situation has led to an increased awareness regarding plastic management, bringing the topic of plastic pollution to the forefront of consumers’ consciousness and resulting in policy development and the setting of ambitious national goals in each country:
• In Malaysia, the government recently launched “Malaysia’s Roadmap Towards
Zero Single-Use Plastics 2018–2030,” while also developing a “Circular Economy Roadmap” to address plastic production, consumption, recycling, and waste management.
• In the Philippines, the government is currently developing new strategies. These include (a) finalizing the “National Plan of
Action for the Reduction of Marine Litter” (published as part of the Philippine
Development Plan (PDP) 2017–2022), which will contribute to the national target to divert 80 percent of national waste by 2022; (b) implementing the Ecological
Solid Waste Management Act (Republic
Act 9003), which is an integrated solid waste management (SWM) plan based on the 3 R’s (reduce, reuse, recycle); and (c) implementing the “Philippine Action
Plan for Sustainable Consumption and
Production” (PAP4SCP). • In Thailand, policy makers committed to protect the marine environment, strengthen regional cooperation, and set a national “Roadmap on Plastic Waste
Management 2018–2030” as a policy framework to manage the country’s plastic-waste problem.
Using a plastic value-chain approach, a series of studies were developed with the support of the World Bank to examine untapped economic opportunities to promote plastics circularity and address marine debris in Malaysia, the Philippines, and Thailand. These studies primarily assessed the market for plastics recycling in each country to engage and increase private sector participation and improve the enabling policy environment for implementing circular-economy business models. In these three countries, more than 75 percent of the material value of plastics is lost when single-use plastics (SUPs) are discarded rather than recovered and recycled. This is equivalent to US$6 billion per year across the three countries, representing an untapped business opportunity if key market barriers can be addressed.
Like the reality in Middle East and North Africa economies, most recycling in these three countries happens separately from the SWM system via the informal sector, and most suppliers of recycled resins are small and medium enterprises (SMEs) challenged by the lack of scale, management systems, technologies, and informal supply networks that are neither fully integrated
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BOX 4.10
nor bear costs similar to the costs borne by regular businesses. Based on consultations with industry stakeholders, several actions could create an enabling environment to increase investment in plastic recycling and reduce waste:
• Demand-side incentives to establish a strong market for recycled plastics (for example, recycled-content targets and green public procurement)
• Government support to reduce capitalinvestment risk (for example, mandating source segregation and setting up extended producer responsibility [EPR] frameworks) • Widening existing government incentives for investments in the adoption of newer technologies and processes (for example, matching grants); increasing the supply of quality plastics (through improved recycling standards, industry targets for the collection of plastics); and sharing know-how, best-in-class innovations, technologies, and processes.
These measures would be a turning point to enable equal opportunities for, and the growth of, a resilient plastic-recycling industry with high-quality products that retain high material value and the ability to increasingly replace virgin materials.
Sources: World Bank 2021a, 2021b, 2021c.
plastic associations need to capitalize on these opportunities. Most recycling companies in the Middle East and North Africa are micro, small, and medium enterprises that are disconnected and challenged by a lack of scale, technology, and technical capacities to take advantage of these market trends.
Some initiatives in GCC countries such as waste-to-power projects are being developed, while recycling plants have started to segregate waste for reuse and to employ technologies for integrated waste management. For example, Abu Dhabi currently recycles 28 percent of nonhazardous waste and composts 6 percent. Dubai’s Smart Sustainability Oasis recycling project currently segregates 18 types of household waste and aims to reduce overall generated waste, thereby diverting 75 percent of waste from landfills by 2021 (Gulf News 2017; WAM 2018). Sharjah’s Bee’ah, a waste management company in the United Arab Emirates, has the highest landfill diversion ratio in the GCC at 76 percent and it is aiming for 100 percent (Ibrahim 2020).24 In 2021, a Bahrain company in collaboration with an Australian firm has started treating hazardous waste and converting it into raw materials for the construction and steel industries.
