EU grant money was used to fund a media workshop on plastic pollution that was run in partnership with a fossil fuel lobby group, DeSmog can reveal.<\/p>\n
The event, held in May, came at a crucial time \u2013 just months before the start of the latest UN Global Plastics Treaty negotiations. The latest round, running from 5 to 14 August, hopes to create the world\u2019s first legally binding agreement on plastic waste.<\/p>\n
The Asia-Europe Foundation (ASEF) assembled 21 journalists from 20 countries<\/a>, including the authors of this article, in Singapore for a four-day workshop that promised to facilitate \u201ca deeper understanding<\/a> among journalists of the challenges and responses to managing plastic waste.\u201d<\/p>\n Global plastic pollution is projected to hit 460 million tonnes<\/a>\u00a0by 2025 and campaigners have urged world leaders to \u201cprovide global rules<\/a> that will control the amount of plastics being produced\u201d and \u201cprotect human health, biodiversity, and the environment from harmful chemicals.\u201d<\/p>\n The workshop was funded from a \u20ac1.5 million three-year EU grant, and a \u20ac270,000 grant from Denmark\u2019s Ministry of Foreign Affairs.<\/p>\n In organising the workshop,\u00a0ASEF partnered\u00a0with the Alliance to End Plastic Waste (AEPW) \u2013 a non-profit whose members<\/a>\u00a0include\u00a0major oil and petrochemical companies such as Shell, ExxonMobil, and TotalEnergies.<\/p>\n The Alliance was founded in 2019 by the American Chemistry Council (ACC), a major plastics trade association, to \u201cchange the conversation away from short-term simplistic bans of plastic\u201d, according to<\/a> an Unearthed investigation.<\/p>\n Fossil fuel firms manufacture\u00a0the base chemicals used in plastic products, seen as a\u00a0major growth market by the industry.<\/p>\n The AEPW has long been accused<\/a> of serving as a PR vehicle for petrochemical companies. Despite pledging in 2019 to invest $1.5 billion and remove 15 million tonnes of plastic waste in five years, the AEPW has invested only $445.13 million<\/a> and collected just 240,000 tonnes of waste. Meanwhile, the oil and gas industry plans<\/a> hundreds of billions in new plastic production facilities.<\/p>\n The AEPW heavily influenced the workshop\u2019s programme, with one of the introductory speakers coming from the group.<\/p>\n AEPW representatives dominated multiple sessions, while several of its grantees and partners filled speaking slots. Thomas Chhoa, a senior advisor to AEPW\u2019s CEO, and Yash Mishra, the group\u2019s head of impact finance, appeared alongside Alliance partners like Greencore<\/a>, which buys plastic waste and turns it into recycled pellets.<\/p>\n At an event ostensibly about plastic waste, none of the speakers was heard mentioning the need to reduce plastic production \u2013 the core issue<\/a> driving the crisis.<\/p>\n Beatriz Santos, an associate editor at the trade magazine Sustainable Plastics, and a participant in the workshop, emphasised: \u201cAlmost no company will tell you that you have to reduce plastic production. I think this is always a problem in discussions where the industry is involved.\u201d<\/p>\n In response to DeSmog, the AEPW claimed it \u201chad minimal input into the agenda and individual presentations\u201d and that \u201cultimately the choice of the speakers was the foundation\u2019s\u201d. However, the Alliance acknowledged that it put ASEF in touch \u201cwith third parties\u201d when asked.<\/p>\n The AEPW said that it supported the event by \u201cpaying for logistics\u201d and providing \u201csome manpower in running the workshop\u201d because \u201cthe objectives of the workshop are aligned with our organisation\u2019s purpose\u201d.<\/p>\n The Plastics Lobby<\/p>\n The oil industry has a powerful voice in plastics negotiations. Its lobbyists have flooded UN treaty negotiations in numbers that dwarf some national delegations, and have embedded themselves as official representatives within delegations<\/a> from countries including China, Egypt, and Finland.<\/p>\n Meanwhile, environmental non-profits and indigenous groups have reported<\/a>\u00a0being systematically marginalised from discussions that will shape global plastics policy.<\/p>\n Big oil\u2019s lobbying efforts have centred on opposing proposals<\/a> to cap plastic production, instead advocating for a focus on waste management, which involves collecting and disposing of plastic materials<\/a>.<\/p>\n It even leverages mainstream media outlets to spread this message. In July 2025, Politico published a sponsored piece from the AEPW, promoting a \u201ccircular economy for plastics<\/a>\u201d centred on improved waste management and recycling rates, while avoiding any mention of plastic production.<\/p>\n This was reflected at the Singapore workshop, where sessions focused on recycling improvements and waste management solutions. There was no discussion about the fact that plastics can only be recycled<\/a> five to seven times before becoming unusable, or that most plastic never gets recycled. The authors of this article only heard one speaker say that burning plastics \u2013 a favoured waste<\/a> management solution of the industry \u2013 isn\u2019t actually recycling.<\/p>\n Lei Wei Soon, a reporter from Malaysia, said that certain parts of the workshop felt \u201cbusiness-oriented\u201d and would have been better replaced with \u201cinsights or experiences shared by local journalists who have reported on plastic waste and environmental issues.\u201d<\/p>\n The AEPW told DeSmog that its promise to invest $1.5 billion included\u00a0pledges from member companies to \u201cinvest into their own sustainability projects\u00a0connected to our mission.\u201d\u00a0The Alliance noted, however, that it has since stopped counting total\u00a0investments from all its members,\u00a0as it cannot \u201caccurately verify and assure\u201d that the pledges are used for projects that meet its standards.<\/p>\n Addressing the shortfall in waste removal targets set in 2019, the AEPW acknowledged that it had been \u201centhusiastic\u201d but had not\u00a0\u201cfully understood the complexity of building integrated waste management systems in underserved regions, where these systems do not exist\u201d.\u00a0It added that it had learned \u201can important and valuable lesson in setting realistic goals\u201d.<\/p>\n Asked whether it viewed the Alliance\u2019s involvement in the workshop as problematic, ASEF defended the partnership, calling the group \u201ca useful supporter, given its knowledge and experience in helping communities manage plastic waste in many parts of the world.\u201d<\/p>\n The EU knew of AEPW\u2019s involvement from the funding application stage but did not intervene. An EU official confirmed that Brussels had been informed of the Alliance\u2019s involvement \u201cto support the workshop\u201d, noting that \u201cthe project proposal included a reference to ASEF approaching the non-profit AEPW, which has an office in Singapore.\u201d<\/p>\n Pressed on whether it would hold ASEF accountable for allowing an industry-aligned body to influence a taxpayer-funded programme, the European Commission deflected entirely, saying only that it would forward any feedback to ASEF.<\/p>\n The Danish Foreign Ministry declined to respond on the record to any of DeSmog\u2019s questions.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"EU grant money was used to fund a media workshop on plastic pollution that was run in partnership…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":58161,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[1397,90,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-58160","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-environment","tag-environment","tag-science","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58160","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=58160"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58160\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/58161"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=58160"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=58160"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=58160"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}