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. 2020 Oct 30;6(44):eabd0288. doi: 10.1126/sciadv.abd0288

Table 3. Countries with the highest mismanaged plastic waste generated by coastal populations in 2016.

The two U.S. estimates (bold text) provide lower and upper bounds reflecting contributions from domestic litter (0.31 Mt), domestic illegal dumping (0.05 to 0.15 Mt), and inadequate management of plastic waste generated during the processing of imported U.S. plastic and paper scrap in countries with greater than 20% inadequately managed waste (0.15 to 0.99 Mt). Mt, million metric tons. HIC, high income; UMC, upper middle income; LMC, lower middle income.

Country Mismanaged
plastic waste
(Mt)
Income status Coastal population
(millions)
Per capita plastic
waste generation
(kg/day)
% Plastic in
solid waste
% Mismanaged
waste
Indonesia 4.28 LMC 202.49 0.68 14.0 61
India 3.16 LMC 201.20 0.57 9.5 79
United States, upper bound 1.45 HIC 117.94 2.72 13.1 2.98
Thailand 1.16 UMC 26.73 1.08 17.6 62
China 1.07 UMC 270.94 0.44 9.8 25
Brazil 1.03 UMC 78.68 1.05 13.5 25
Philippines 1.01 LMC 92.06 0.39 10.6 74
Egypt, Arab Rep. 0.71 LMC 24.82 0.68 13.0 90
Japan 0.67 HIC 114.26 0.96 11.0 15
Russian Federation 0.62 UMC 10.93 1.13 14.2 98
Vietnam 0.57 LMC 59.46 0.34 12.2 64
United States, lower bound 0.51 HIC 117.94 2.72 13.1 2.33
Bangladesh 0.36 LMC 75.87 0.28 4.7 97
Kuwait 0.35 HIC 3.03 1.59 20.0 100
Oman 0.35 HIC 3.83 1.18 21.0 100
Dominican Republic 0.33 UMC 8.83 1.11 10.0 94
Malaysia 0.33 UMC 24.90 1.23 15.0 20
Mexico 0.27 UMC 24.48 1.20 10.9 23
Argentina 0.26 HIC 17.58 1.14 14.6 25
Peru 0.25 UMC 14.67 0.77 10.5 58
Italy 0.25 HIC 34.59 1.31 11.6 13