Managing Marine Litter: Exploring the Evolving Role of International and European Law in Confronting a Persistent Environmental Problem

• Author: Arie Trouwborst
• Position: LLM, is a lecturer in international and European environmental law at the Department of European and International Public Law of Tilburg Law School in the Netherlands, and is a member of the Tilburg Sustainability Center (TSC) and the Center for Transboundary Legal Development (CTLD)
• Pages: 4-18

Managing Marine Litter:

Exploring the Evolving Role of International and European Law

in Confronting a Persistent Environmental Problem

Arie Trouwborst

Merkourios 2011 – Volume 27/Issue 73, Article, pp. 04-18.

URN: NBN:NL:UI:10-1-100930

ISSN: 0927-460X

URL: www.merkourios.org

Publisher: Igitur, Utrecht Publishing & Archiving Services

Copyright: this work has been licensed by the Creative Commons Attribution License (3.0)

Keywords

Marine litter, Plastic pollution, International Environmental Law, OSPAR Convention, Marine Strategy Framework Direc-

tive.

Abstract

e contamination of the world’s oceans by human garbage, especially plastics, ranks among those environmental problems

whose resolution appears remote, despite the considerable public attention paid to the ‘Great Garbage Patch’ in the Pacic,

‘plastic soup’, and the like. is ‘marine litter’ (or ‘marine debris’) problem is characterized by diuse sources and an array of

adverse environmental impacts, including entanglement of and ingestion by albatrosses, fulmars, turtles, seals and a variety

of other marine wildlife. is article explores the evolving role of international law in the eorts to manage marine litter,

including recent developments involving the Convention for the Protection of the Marine Environment of the North-East

Atlantic (OSPAR Convention) and the European Union’s Marine Strategy Framework Directive (MSFD).

Author Aliations

Dr Arie Trouwborst, LLM, is a lecturer in international and European environmental law at the Department of European

and International Public Law of Tilburg Law School in the Netherlands, and is a member of the Tilburg Sustainability Center

(TSC) and the Center for Transboundary Legal Development (CTLD).

Article

Merkourios - International and European Environmental Law - Vol. 27/73 04