Pressure to delay the entry into force of new European rules to combat deforestation is coming from everywhere and reaching the ground floor of the Berlaymont building, where the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, sits.
Countries like Germany, political organisations like the European People’s Party, which is the main parliamentary force, and the Von der Leyen family, and affected sectors like supermarket employers have lodged complaints against the EUDR (European Deforestation Regulation) on the grounds that there is not enough time to adapt to new demands.
The regulation, agreed in late 2022, sets January 1, 2025 as the date on which a series of rules will start to apply to ensure that EU imports do not contribute to forest degradation, which has already caused some 420 million hectares of forest (an area larger than the European Union) to be lost between 1990 and 2020.
The regulation requires companies to carry out strict due diligence if they trade in or export from the EU market products such as palm oil, livestock, soy, coffee, cocoa, wood and rubber, as well as their derivatives. Imports of these products will have to undergo verification procedures to check that their production does not come from deforested areas.
“Regulations must be sustainable,” German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, the European leader who has been most open to criticism from economic sectors, recently said.
But the complaint does not only come from European capitals, but also from the countries that will be affected by the European regulation: from Australia to Brazil. “To avoid any impact on our trade relations, we ask that the EU does not apply the regulations from the end of 2024 and that it urgently reviews its approach to this matter,” Lula da Silva’s government expressed in a letter delivered to the Ministry of Agriculture. Commissioner, Januz Wojciechowski. The majority of products affected by the legislation come from Brazil and represent 30% of its exports to that country.
Moratorium of six months to one year
EPP MEPs have also spoken out against the entry into force of the regulation and have called for a one-year moratorium. For the time being, the European Commission points out that the date has been known for almost two years, when the agreement was reached with the European Parliament and the Council of the EU (the governments). However, the EU has put the brakes on much of the green agenda following protests, mainly from the countryside.
Environmentalists, however, argue that the regulation must be put in place as quickly as possible and that too much time has already been wasted. In fact, they have criticised the settlement agreement, saying it contains “gaps”, such as a lack of ambition in including some forest lands or a failure to take into account respect for human rights.
The employers of the distribution and supermarkets (EuroCommerce) denounce that the European Commission has not given them enough guidelines to be able to implement the new regulation and that they do not have the technological development required by the regulation to demonstrate its compliance. “We support the objectives of the legislation, but the conditions for compliance are not yet ready”, says the organization’s general director, Christel Delberghe, who assures that she is very “disappointed” by the European Commission.
Patterns and prices
What they claim is that they need “at least six months” for the regulation to be applied. “It is a problem of material time and lack of knowledge,” explains Ignacio García Magarzo, general director of ASEDAS, the association of supermarkets such as Mercadona, Dia or Lidl: “In the case of distributors, we share a responsibility based on the information that our suppliers have. What they claim is that they have “great difficulty in knowing the criteria for applying the new regulation from January 1”: “We find it very difficult, if not impossible, for it to be applied.”
The implementation of the green agenda is one of the concerns of the employers’ union in its lobbying work with the European institutions. Thus, they are protesting against the regulation on packaging that will impose the introduction of deposit, refund and return mechanisms, similar to what some northern European countries are already doing.
“In Spain, this will require a significant effort. This does not mean that we are behind, but rather that Spain has had a management model and now it will have to integrate one or more others,” says García Magarzo, who acknowledges that “this will entail new costs” and, therefore, will have an impact on prices.
They are also concerned about the regulation on late payments, with which the EU intends that payments in the value chain are made within a maximum of 30 days. What supermarket employers argue is that the possibility of negotiating conditions benefits companies of all sizes and encourages competition. “This is a blow to our sector because we are at the end of the chain,” Delberghe complains.
