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Governance and Innovation in Plastic Waste Management: The Case of Japan

Wood Material Science and Engineering 2025 1 citation ? Citation count from OpenAlex, updated daily. May differ slightly from the publisher's own count.
Minoo Tehrani, Yu Cui

Summary

Researchers examined Japan's plastic waste governance framework, finding that despite generating over eight million tons of plastic waste annually, less than a quarter is materially recycled, with thermal recycling dominating and regulatory innovation lagging behind the scale of the pollution challenge.

Polymers
Body Systems
Study Type Environmental

This study investigates plastic waste management, focusing on Japan. The volume of plastic waste in Japan is more than eight million tons, and less than a quarter of the plastic waste is subjected to recycling. Considering that Japan is an archipelago consisting of a combination of four large islands and numerous smaller ones, plastic waste that enters the ocean poses significant threats to marine life, birds, other living beings, and beach pollution. This research explores the underlying factors that have made Japan one of the highest users of plastic. In addition, this study evaluates different strategies that are utilized in Japan to deal with the reduction in plastic utilization and plastic waste. The final section of the study proposes strategies that can reduce utilization of plastic and production of plastic waste and the new and future outlook for replacement of plastic.

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