Less than 10 percent of plastic used worldwide is recycled, the OECD said, calling for "coordinated and global solutions" ahead of expected talks on an international treaty on the issue.
A new report from the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development found that 460 million tonnes of plastic were used last year, nearly doubling the number since 2000.
The amount of plastic waste had more than doubled during that time to 353 million tonnes, the Paris-based OECD said.
After accounting for recycling losses, only nine percent of plastic waste was ultimately recycled, while 19 percent was incinerated and almost 50 percent went to landfills.
"The remaining 22 percent was dumped in uncontrolled landfills, burned in open pits or released into the environment."
The COVID-19 pandemic saw plastic use fall by 2.2 percent in 2020 compared to the previous year. However, single-use plastics increased and overall use is "expected to increase again" as the economy recovers.
Plastics contributed to 3.4 percent of global greenhouse emissions in 2019, 90 percent of them from "production and conversion from fossil fuels," the report said.
In the face of rampant global warming and pollution, "it will also be essential that countries respond to the challenge with coordinated and global solutions," OECD Secretary-General Mathias Cormann said in the report.
The OECD proposed a series of "levers" to address the issue, including developing the market for recycled plastics, which represent only 6 percent of the total, largely because they are more expensive.
He added that new technologies related to reducing the environmental footprint of plastics accounted for only 1.2 percent of all product-related innovation.
While calling for "a more circular plastic life cycle", the OECD said policies should also curb overall consumption.
He also called for "huge investments in basic waste management infrastructure," including 25 billion euros ($28 billion) a year to go toward efforts in low- and middle-income countries.
The report comes less than a week before the start of the UN Environment Assembly on February 28 in Nairobi, where formal talks are expected to begin on a future international plastics treaty, the scope of which will be discussed.
Shardul Agrawala, head of the OECD's environment and economy integration division, said Tuesday's report "further emphasizes the need for countries to come together to start looking towards a global agreement to address this very important problem".
Asked about the priorities of the treaty to be discussed in Nairobi, he said that "there is an urgent problem of waste management, which is responsible for most of the leakage into the environment".
"But we should not limit our focus only to the completion of pipeline solutions, there is a greater need in the long term to create international cooperation and agreement towards the convergence of standards," he said in an online press conference.
In a poll released Tuesday by polling firm Ipsos for the World Wildlife Fund, 88 percent of respondents stressed the importance of an international treaty to combat plastic pollution.
In the 28 countries surveyed, 23 percent of respondents said such a treaty was "fairly important," 31 percent said it was "very important," and 34 percent said it was "essential."
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