Overview and policy highlights

This overview chapter outlines the methodology and key findings of the Global Plastics Outlook: Policy Scenarios to 2060. It presents projections of plastics use, waste and leakage in the absence of new policies, as well as with a set of ambitious policy packages to bend the plastics curve. This second volume of the Global Plastics Outlook is a follow-up to the Global Plastics Outlook: Economic Drivers, Environmental Impacts and Policy Options released in February 2022 that quantified trends up to 2019 in plastics use, waste generation and leakage, as well as four policy levers – markets for recycled plastics, innovation, domestic policies and international co-operation – to curb the environmental impacts of plastics.