A new report from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine recommends that the U.S. establish a nationally coordinated and expanded monitoring system to track plastic pollution in order to understand the scale and sources of the U.S. plastic waste problem, set reduction and management priorities, and measure progress in addressing it. The report shows that at least 8.8 million metric tons of plastic waste enter the world’s oceans each year — the equivalent of dumping a garbage truck of plastic into the ocean every minute — and in 2016 the U.S. generated more plastic waste than any other country, exceeding that of all European Union member states combined.

The report recommends the U.S. establish a coherent, comprehensive, and crosscutting federal policy and research strategy to reduce its contribution of plastic waste to the environment and ocean by December 31, 2022. The report lays out six intervention stages that the strategy should address:

1. Reducing plastic production

2. Innovating design and materials to develop substitutes for plastics

3. Decreasing waste generation

4. Improving waste management

5. Capturing waste in the environment

6. Minimizing at-sea disposal