The Ocean Cleanup and United Nations ESCAP target Asia-Pacific ocean plastic solutions to protect oceans

Boyan Slat, Founder & CEO of The Ocean Cleanup

SYDNEY, AUSTRALIA, October 12, 2026 /EINPresswire.com/ -- Global non-profit The Ocean Cleanup and the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP) are entering into a collaboration to jointly develop the Asia-Pacific Clean Oceans Infrastructure Partnership.

The Asia-Pacific Clean Ocean Infrastructure partnership (APCOIP) will bring together waste management infrastructure, river and coastal interception, government policy, and private-sector investment under one coordinated framework.

It aims to reduce plastic flows from major urban centres into rivers and then oceans in a way that shifts from individual clean-up projects to instead address the infrastructure and policy systems that allow plastic to leak into the environment in the first place.

This represents an expansion of The Ocean Cleanup's current “interception” approach and focuses on capturing plastic that has already escaped into waterways.

This approach has so far seen The Ocean Cleanup intercepting up to 5 percent of the plastic reaching the ocean through river systems, with current targets to intercept up to one-third by 2030 through its existing 30 Cities Program.

APCOIP is intended to place this interception work within a broader regional framework that is capable of addressing the infrastructure and policy gaps upstream in addition to The Ocean Cleanup’s work downstream, through four interconnected pillars.

Waste management infrastructure: Strengthening municipal waste systems in major urban centres, including Jakarta, Manila and Kuala Lumpur, to reduce the amount of plastic entering waterways in the first place.

River and coastal intervention: Deploying proven Interceptor solutions and clean-up approaches to capture plastic already leaking into rivers and coastal environments, with The Ocean Cleanup as the programme's exclusive partner in this area.

Policy and government engagement: Working with governments across the Asia-Pacific region to address the regulatory, institutional and policy conditions contributing to plastic leakage and inadequate waste management.

Private-sector investment: Developing public-private models to bring companies, governments and investors together to finance and deliver the infrastructure required at scale.

The Ocean Cleanup will jointly develop APCOIP with ESCAP whose regional mandate and relationships across Asia and the Pacific provide a platform for connecting these challenges across national boundaries.

This includes memberships that includes Australia, New Zealand and Fiji alongside the Southeast Asian countries where The Ocean Cleanup will direct two-thirds of its operations over the next three years.

Southeast Asia currently contributes ~79 percent* of the ocean plastic arriving in Australian waters from overseas, making the region’s rivers a matter of Australian interest as much as a regional one.
Discussions with stakeholders in the region, including key development finance institutions, governments, and other organizations in the region, indicate considerable interest in launching a structured regional programme on river interception to address the problem of plastics pollution in a more integrated manner, and potential future support for its implementation.

Stronger waste management and plastic interception systems upstream will play an increasingly critical role in protecting Australia's marine environment downstream, according to The Ocean Cleanup.

Boyan Slat, founder & CEO of The Ocean Cleanup, said: “The future health of Australia's marine environment depends on waste systems working properly in cities thousands of kilometres away. Our Interceptor solutions catch plastic once it has already reached a river, which buys time, and that time only counts if the waste infrastructure and the policy behind that river catch up.

"APCOIP puts our river work inside a programme that also deals with municipal waste, regulation, and the capital to pay for it. We cannot fix the upstream half on our own, which is why we are building this with ESCAP."

Shombi Sharp, Deputy Executive Secretary of ESCAP, said: "Plastic reaches the ocean across borders, so the response has to be transboundary too, and that is the work ESCAP exists to coordinate. The Ocean Cleanup has proven what interception can do in individual rivers, and our role is to connect that work to the governments, development banks, and investors who decide what happens on land. That combination protects the marine environment while building better waste systems for the communities living alongside those rivers."

A Letter of Intent has been signed between ESCAP and the Ocean Cleanup on September 25, 2026 to take forward this partnership.

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The Ocean Cleanup (theoceancleanup.com) is a global nonprofit that develops and scales solutions to rid the world's oceans of plastic. By conducting extensive research, engineering scalable solutions, and partnering with governments, industry, and like-minded organizations, The Ocean Cleanup is working to stop plastic inflow via rivers and remove legacy plastic already polluting the oceans. As of September 2026, the non-profit has collected over 62 million kilograms (136.6 million pounds) of trash from aquatic ecosystems around the world. Founded in 2013 by Boyan Slat, The Ocean Cleanup now employs a multi-disciplined team of approximately 200 people. The organization is headquartered in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, with international operations in 12 countries.

About ESCAP
The United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP) is one of the five regional commissions of the United Nations, supporting regional cooperation among its member states across Asia and the Pacific, including Australia, New Zealand and Fiji, on sustainable development challenges. Visit unescap.org.

Priyanka Dogra
Third Hemisphere
theoceancleanup@thirdhemisphere.agency