India, Australia and Singapore are jointly working towards the commitment in addressing the global marine plastic pollution issue. As a part of the effort, the three governments conducted an international workshop on February 14-15 on combating marine pollution with the focus on marine plastic debris.
The virtual workshop aimed to discuss research interventions toward monitoring and assessing marine litter and plausible sustainable solutions to address the global marine plastic pollution issue.
Several world’s leading experts, scientists, government officials with policy expertise, and representatives from industry, innovation and informal sectors took part in the workshop, which had four major sessions, the Ministry of Earth Science said in a release.
The sessions included the magnitude of the marine litter problem-monitoring programme and research on plastic debris in the Indo-Pacific Region; best practices and technologies; solutions to prevent plastic pollution; and polymers and plastics: technology and innovations and opportunities for regional collaboration to remediate or stop plastic pollution, it stated.
The sessions involved panel discussions and interactive break-out sessions to encourage discussion among participants from East Asia Summit countries, it added.
Dr M Ravichandran, Secretary, Ministry of Earth Sciences, Government of India, delivered the keynote address at the workshop and suggested considering the application of technological tools such as remote sensing, artificial intelligence and machine learning to map the distribution of marine plastics and developing models to understand the dynamics of plastics in the Indian ocean. He also emphasized that a well-designed and tailor-made management strategy considering regional distinctiveness will significantly reduce plastics in the environment, the ministry stated.
Earlier, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had announced the agenda of promoting maritime cooperation in the wider Indo-Pacific region at the 14th EAS held in Bangkok in November 2019.
The ministry stated that India, Singapore, and Australia are committed to implementing the EAS decisions.
According to the ministry, the workshop provided an impetus to EAS countries for exploring and informing each other about the challenges, questions, and solutions to marine litter – especially plastic research, use, design, disposal, recycling, and future collaborations for a plastic-free and healthy ocean for sustainable development through knowledge partners – the National Centre for Coastal Research (NCCR), Chennai, an attached office of Ministry of Earth Sciences (MoES), the Government of Singapore and the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation, Australia.
