Delay in EU anti-deforestation enforcement leaves little time to make changes

The European Commission has proposed a one-year extension to the transition period for enforcing the EU's anti-deforestation regulation (EUDR), following months of pressure from member states, trade partners, and stakeholders.

The law applies to soy, livestock, palm oil, coffee, cocoa, rubber and timber produced both inside and outside the EU.

After weeks of speculation, the Commission made a formal proposal on Wednesday (2 October) to extend the transition period by 12 months, to "serve as a phase-in period to ensure proper and effective implementation".

"If approved by the European Parliament and the Council, the law would apply from 30 December 2025 for large companies and from 30 June 2026 for micro and small enterprises," the Commission's press release reads.

Under the current rules, companies have until 30 December this year to comply with the new due diligence requirements, while smaller companies have until 30 June 2025.

The Commission has justified the delay by citing "feedback" from international partners on their readiness for implementation. It also noted that EU stakeholders are at different levels of readiness, with some well prepared and others expressing concerns about meeting the initial deadlines.

In addition to the proposal to postpone enforcing the EU's anti-deforestation regulation,  the Commission also published long-awaited guidance, including key clarifications on the scope of the regulation, updated FAQs, and the methodology it will use to develop a benchmark for assessing deforestation risk.

Next steps

The European Parliament and Council now have less than three months to conclude inter-institutional negotiations.

"We will do our best to adopt it as soon as possible," a Hungarian presidency source told Euractiv.

The announcement drew immediate reactions from member states such as Czechia and Austria, which have been vocal in calling for a delay.

"I have been campaigning for a postponement of the deforestation regulation for a long time," Czech Agriculture Minister Marek Výborný commented on the decision to Euractiv, adding that the rules would put certain businesses "in a precarious situation."

“I agree with the basic idea of the regulation on deforestation (...) However, this is not a problem in Czechia or in most European countries,” he said. In April 2023, the extension was backed by at least 12 EU agriculture ministers during a Council meeting.

However, the power to amend the regulation lies with both the Council and Members of the European Parliament – and many fear that reopening the file could end up weakening some of its provisions.

While European People’s Party (EPP) leader Manfred Weber said he was in favour of the delay, others, including Socialist MEP Delara Burkhardt, an environmental lawmaker and one of the EUDR negotiators, condemned it.

"We will do everything we can to ensure that the conservative EPP group around the CDU and CSU does not exploit the newly opened legislative procedure to shrink the regulation," said Burkhard.

Thomas Waitz, the coordinator of the Greens/EFA group in the European Parliament's Agriculture Committee, said the extension should allow companies to implement the rules by next year.

"With the EU Deforestation Regulation's extended deadline, all companies should be able to implement it by next year. There are no more excuses. The regulation must not be watered down by the postponement," he added.

A coalition of cocoa companies including Nestlé, Ferrero, Mondelēz, Mars, Tony's Chocolonely and NGOs such as the Rainforest Alliance and Solidaridad "strongly oppose" calls to reopen the substance of the EUDR during the upcoming negotiations.

To speed up the process, the European Parliament can invoke the urgent procedure, as it did earlier this year to adjust certain rules under the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), and send the proposal directly to a plenary vote, bypassing the report of the European Parliament's Environment Committee (ENVI).

According to the relevant rules, the request for an urgent procedure can be made by a committee, a political group, a certain number of MEPs, the president of the European Parliament, the Council, or the Commission.

The Commission could not confirm to Euractiv that such a request had been made.

*Maria Simon Arboleas contributed to this article.

[Edited by Angelo Di Mambro and Daniel Eck]