Maritime Trade and the Afterlives of Plastic in Tawi-Tawi, Philippines and Sabah, Malaysia
This study examines how plastic products and packaging move across maritime routes between Tawi-Tawi and Sabah. Jawi-Tawi, the southernmost island province of the Philippines, lies in the Sulu Archipelago near Sabah, a Malaysian state on northern Borneo. Together, these sites form part of a historically connected corridor shaped by trade, migration, and kinship networks linking the southern Philippines and Malaysia. While plastic pollution is often studied through marine debris, municipal waste, or global waste trade, less attention has been paid to how everyday plastics move through formal and informal maritime economies before becoming waste.
Drawing on political ecology, discard studies, and waste colonialism, the study asks how cross-border trade, port infrastructures, and uneven regional patterns of consumption and disposal shape transboundary plastic leakage and shift waste burdens onto small-island and borderland communities. Using participant observation, semi-structured interviews, packaging-origin analysis, and secondary data and policy analysis, the project will trace how plastic products and packaging circulate, accumulate, and become environmental burdens. It also examines the governance gaps that limit traceability and accountability for marine plastic pollution across the Tawi-Tawi-Malaysia maritime corridor. The study contributes to debates on environmental justice, cross-border economies, and the limits of territorially bounded waste policies in maritime Southeast Asia.
Research Proposal Presentation:
Drawing on political ecology, discard studies, and waste colonialism, the study asks how cross-border trade, port infrastructures, and uneven regional patterns of consumption and disposal shape transboundary plastic leakage and shift waste burdens onto small-island and borderland communities. Using participant observation, semi-structured interviews, packaging-origin analysis, and secondary data and policy analysis, the project will trace how plastic products and packaging circulate, accumulate, and become environmental burdens. It also examines the governance gaps that limit traceability and accountability for marine plastic pollution across the Tawi-Tawi-Malaysia maritime corridor. The study contributes to debates on environmental justice, cross-border economies, and the limits of territorially bounded waste policies in maritime Southeast Asia.
Research Proposal Presentation: