Ewoud Lauwerier, Ph.D.

Plastic Policy Expert

Ewoud Lauwerier’s commitment to the environment dates back to his childhood. After a short career in the Belgian federal administration, and a Ph.D. in political science about European foreign security and defence policy at the University of Lausanne, he decided to reconnect with his old passions. In further work in the academic sphere, Ewoud Lauwerier focussed on European agricultural and pesticides policy, the implementation of planetary boundaries as guidelines for public policies, and European and Swiss policies to deal with single use plastics and plastic pollution. An adept of zero waste and buying locally as drivers of personal action, he also beliefs in the necessity of a systemic, and actually philosophical change to tackle the multiple interconnected problems caused by a socio-economic system disconnected from the rest of nature. In his current research, Ewoud Lauwerier focusses on the knowledge production about plastic by the industry and the nature of their claims and discourse. Since 2021, Ewoud Lauwerier supports OceanCare’s work on plastic pollution and its commitment to promote legislative changes and measures to tackle the plastic crisis at its roots, both internationally and in Switzerland.