COP vs SOM: Officials And Parties and Plastic Sustainability

Let's look at the difference between between a Senior Officials Meeting (SOM) and a Conference of the Parties (COP) in the context of international meetings.

Key Differences

• Level of Participation: SOMs involve senior officials below the ministerial or head of state level, while COPs involve higher-level representatives and decision-makers.
• Purpose: SOMs are preparatory and focused on technical or preliminary discussions. COPs are decision-making forums where binding agreements can be made.
• Outcomes: SOMs produce draft documents, recommendations, or preparatory work. COPs can result in binding international agreements or significant policy decisions.

SOMs are preparatory meetings focused on groundwork and technical discussions, while COPs are high-level, formal meetings where binding decisions and significant agreements are made.

I noticed that if you visit, photograph, or record either SOMs or COPs, a layperson would be hard-pressed to tell the difference.  A bunch of people with titles and badges from various countries show up and vote on language concerning a new or existing convention.

Here is a video of a Senior Officials Meeting for the World Trade Organization.

The Guardian Environmental Division Experiences Situational Irony

Carmignac photojournalism award: Ghana and e-waste

Photojournalists Muntaka Chasant and Bénédicte Kurzen and investigative journalist Anas Aremeyaw Anas have documented the flow of electronic waste between Europe and Ghana for the 13^th edition of the Carmignac Photojournalism Award

By Muntaka Chasant, Bénédicte Kurzen, Anas Aremeyaw Anas and Fondation Carmignac

The opening paragraph of the Guardian's weekend E-Waste Ghana Story is fascinating, because it goes on to completely disprove itself in award-winning own-goalism.  The Guardian attempts to actually do what we've been calling on them to do for more than a decade - interview the diaspora and the Tech Sector in the Importing Nations, and don't focus on Basel Action Network and Greenpeace's whitemansplaining of how people buy stuff for reuse.  In so attempting, not unlike 2015's UNEP Waste Report "Waste Crime Waste Risks" (where the documentation completely obliterated the Executive Summary, see "Criminal Negligence" reviews in Discard Studies), the Guardian completely nails its own coffin.

Jerry Sekou Adara: “I had a dispute with the environment department here in Holland and we went to court. I asked them: ‘How do you come to the conclusion that these goods are waste? Who checks them?’ Deciding that something is waste is like going to the doctor. You’re told what illness you have. Don’t say a television is waste beyond repair just because you plugged it in and didn’t see any image. The judge in court was a lady and a very good judge. I said to her: ‘Look, this laptop is not waste when it’s on your table, but it is waste when in African hands.’” She knew I was telling the truth. The economy is good for the people here – they don’t suffer – and what they think of as waste here, somebody will use in Africa.”