Federal government launches new action plan against marine litter

The ocean’s biodiversity is under serious pressure. One of the biggest threats to biodiversity is litter, and specifically plastic pollution. The Belgian federal government recognises the problem and wishes to tackle it. A new action plan was therefore presented to the press on 26 July.

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01 August 2022

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On 26 July, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for the North Sea Vincent Van Quickenborne and Minister for the Environment Zakia Khattabi explained the second Federal Marine Litter Action Plan (2022-2027). This new plan builds on the first Federal Marine Litter Action Plan, which was in force from 2017 to 2021.

The new action plan focuses on two objectives: ensuring that as little litter as possible ends up in the North Sea, and removing the litter already present from the North Sea. To put this into practice, a wide range of concrete actions and initiatives were identified.

Several of these actions also include Blue Cluster partners and members. We will list a few of these actions below.

Specific actions

Database for marine micro-waste according to international reporting guidelines (Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences (RBINS));
Mapping the plastic flux to the sea (Department for the Marine Environment; Flanders Marine Institute (VLIZ));
Guidelines for less litter in Belgian aquaculture (Department for the Marine Environment; Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences (RBINS));
Standards and norms for fishing and aquaculture gear (The Department for the Marine Environment; Centexbel).

Would you like more information on one of the other actions? Check out the Federal Marine Litter Action Plan.