The Trash Free Waters Partnership will be officially launched in Jamaica at the National Environment and Planning Agency (NEPA) office on the 18th of August, 2016.
Announced at the recently concluded Our Oceans Conference, the United States and the UNEP Caribbean Environment Programme formed a new partnership involving countries in the Wider Caribbean Region to implement "Trash Free Waters", the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s collaborative approach to significantly reducing marine litter.
In collaboration with the United States Peace Corps and its volunteers on the ground, this collaboration will support actions to reduce land-based sources of trash in local communities through approaches that can drive national policy initiatives on solid waste and marine litter.
Jamaica and Panama will be the initial pilot countries in 2016 to demonstrate the "Trash Free Waters" approach and its benefits to public health and the environment while keeping significant amounts of litter from reaching the Caribbean Sea.