Environmental sustainability for metals: UNEA 5 adopted resolution 5/12

laurentkrull
Jan 31, 2024
1 min read

Last September 2023, a Global Intergovernmental Meeting on Minerals and Metals took place in Geneva.

The regional consultations were mandated to:

take stock of existing activities and actions to enhance the environmental sustainability of minerals and metals;
identify best practices, responsible business practices, standards, guidelines, technical tools, environmentally sustainable technologies, and renewable energy uses in mining;
identify opportunities for enhanced international cooperation; and
identify possible ways forward for consideration at UNEA 6.

In addition, the consultations discussed two other mining topics which the resolution mandates the UNEP Executive Director to report on at UNEA 6, namely: the environmentally sound extraction and use of sand; and environmental aspects of tailings management.

UNEA 5 (fifth session of UN Environment Assembly) adopted resolution 5/12 requesting UNEP (UN Environment Program) to convene intergovernmental regional consultations, intended to feed into a global intergovernmental meeting to develop NPPs (non-prescriptive proposals) to enhance the environmental sustainability of minerals and metals along their full life cycle, in line with the 2030 Agenda.