Chair, distinguished delegates, colleagues,

I deliver this statement on behalf of the EU and its 27 Member States.

We would like to thank you, Chair, and your team, the INC-Secretariat, and UNEP as well as fellow delegates and observers and stakeholders for all your work. 

Our special thanks and appreciation go to our host, Switzerland, for the commitment and hospitality and for making sure that Delegates have had the best possible conditions and that the organization ran smoothly.

Chair, we cannot hide that the European Union and its Member States had higher expectations.

We came to conclude a global plastics Treaty here in Geneva.

We have confidence in the science that impels us.

Confidence in the people that pushed us.

Confidence in a majority of countries of both developing and developed that are aligned.

And the businesses and civil society who want a global binding treaty for a clean, competitive, circular economy and public health and well-being.

That is what we fought for.

We have not managed to get there.

But we have advanced significantly in our joint work and have a new, improved draft on the table.

Chair, your last improved draft falls still short of our demands on a number of points.

But we realise that the perfect cannot be the enemy of the good.

So, we see the outcome of this session as a good basis for a resumed session INC 5.3.

But let us also be honest and learn from the process that has brought us here today. We must then also reflect on how we can work together better in the time to come.

As I look around the room I see fathers, mothers, grandparents, aunts, and uncles. We all have the responsibility to solve one of the most existential problems of our time, plastic pollution.

We owe this to our children and future generations.

The EU is clear: we do not accept a stillborn treaty. We do not accept that we cannot strengthen our action over time.

So that is why we will keep striving for better.

I cannot help but thinking of my 2-year old granddaughter, Sofie. Her name means wisdom.

I wish us all a lot of wisdom as we move forward.

The Earth is not ours only, we are stewards for those who come after us. Lets fulfil that duty.