Exclusive: Sector-wide environmental concerns emerge over EU Commission plans to further delay EUDR laws

Major concerns have been raised as the European Commission confirms that it is proposing to delay the introduction of its landmark EUDR environmental laws by a further year, reports Neill Barston.

The mammoth legislation, which was developed as a mandatory system of compelling European companies to prove zero deforestation in their supply chains across sectors including cocoa, palm oil, soy, as well as other core commodities, has been thrown into disarray with the latest announcement from the continental authority. 

In its already delayed and amended form that has sparked much criticism over allegations of watering down its categorisation of high risk countries, the legislation was due to come in at December 2025, which was raised during our World Confectionery Conference this month (below). The EU Commission is now proposing to double that delay until December 2026.

Jessika Roswall, European Commissioner for environment, water resilience and a competitive circular economy issued a statement on the issue, amid a programme of ‘simplification’ of its EUDR frameworks, which many industry observers have labelled as having severely negatively impacted the proposals, in removing the need for smaller enterprises employing below 500 people to have to engage with EUDR requirements. The original plans for annual reporting of data on an annual basis has also been removed, with it now only being required every three years.

The commissioner said: “Despite our efforts towards simplification, we believe that we cannot implement without disruption for our businesses and supply chains. And we have concerns about the IT system and the amount of information we put in it. That is why we will seek with co-legislators for postponement within one year. This will give us time to look at the different risks.”

Environmental groups including Mighty Earth, the WWF and Rainforest Alliance, as well as many global confectionery companies and snacks manufacturers have repeatedly warned against delaying the delivery additionally, against a backdrop of considerable climate impact on agricultural operations around the world, which have been hit with increased adverse weather, as well as heightened incidents of crop diseases.

Major forest loss
As Confectionery Production has previously reported, despite recent efforts to introduce agroforestry and the cross-industry “Cocoa and Forests Initiative,”  West Africa has been hit especially hard, with Ivory Coast having estimated to have lost up to 90% of its primary forests since 1950 according to sector studies.

Meanwhile, in neighbouring Ghana, with which it makes up two thirds of the cocoa supply chain serving the confectionery industry, deforestation rate believed to be at around 65% since that period. This has threatened the future viability of cocoa and related trades.

Consequently, after being launched to much fanfare and broad cross-sector backing, the policies were supposed to be introduced at the end of 2024, were pushed back to the end of 2025 following right wing political lobbying, as well as approaches from confectionery and snacks sector businesses such as Mondelez International, to further delay its implementation.

However, this was at odds with the vast majority of the confectionery, snacks and bakery sector, which acknowledged the need for the legislation in recognition of the damaging effects that deforestation has had on many nations. Within the cocoa sector alone, 

Under the original EUDR policies, businesses had been given two years prior to 2024 to prepare for the unprecedented scheme – which companies have argued has come at a time when they are now facing major US tariffs that have threatened their competitive edge. 

There had also been concerns within Asian regions including Indonesia and Malaysia, over the scale and cost of implementing the venture, which were believed to have been expressed to the EU in present negotiations surrounding a new Free Trade agreement struck this week. 

Furthermore, serious concerns regarding the readiness of the underlying IT infrastructure surrounding the reporting of satellite geomapped farm data also prompted the EU Commission to propose rolling-back the start-date for the landmark legislation.

However, a number of forward-thinking industry businesses, including Tony’s Chocolonely which was founded on an original vision of creating a ‘slave free’ supply chain, warned last year that there was no justification for further delay to the legal frameworks. 

Significantly, major businesses – those employing 500 people or more, that would be the first the laws would apply to, have already spent several years preparing for the scheme, as well as multi-million costs in ensuring that their companies are already compliant in the anticipation that it was due to be brought in at the end of last year.

Furthermore, as our title has previously covered this summer, there have been significant concerns within farming communities over how the EUDR programme would operate.

Moreover, many agricultural workers, many of whom are still working in Ghana and Ivory Coast for wages well below UN-defined poverty levels, have not been informed fully of how they are supposed to engage with data monitoring, with the actual requirements still yet to be fully enacted.

Anke Schulmeister-Oldenhove, Forest Policy Manager at the WWF European Policy Office, expressed fears that there was sufficient will to implement the scheme as anticipated.

She said: “It is probably no coincidence that this move comes right as the Commission pursues an unprecedented deregulation agenda, throwing the EUDR under the bus. This is unacceptable and a massive embarrassment for President Von der Leyen and her Commission. If this technical issue is real, this shows not only incompetence, but also a clear lack of political will to invest sufficiently in a timely implementation of the EUDR.”

Similarly, having  been among backers of the EUDR legislation, the non-profit group Mighty Earth issued a swift response to news of its proposed additional delays.

Isabel Fernandez, Senior Consultant for the group, said: “It’s a startling coincidence that just after the European Commission signs trade deals with the US and Indonesia, it moves to delay the EUDR once again, conveniently blaming IT problems.”

“Having proposed a world-class piece of legislation to combat deforestation, the EC has now decided it would rather do trade deals with Trump’s US and Indonesia, which is currently driving the world’s biggest deforestation project in Papua.”

“This proposed 1-year delay is totally unacceptable, and massively disadvantages the companies and countries which have gone all out to be ready for implementation in December of this year. It also ignores the will of EU citizens who don’t want to buy products tied to deforestation. This proposal – at a time when we are experiencing a climate, nature and deforestation crisis and after the record-breaking fires in Europe this summer – should be firmly rejected.”

For his part, Antonie Fountain, co-founder of the Voice Network, a non-profit group dedicated to addressing government accountability in supply chains, described the latest EU Commission proposal as a ‘deeply disappointing day,” asserting that the major sustainability legislation had undergone a “DOGE like simplification chainsaw,” that severely weakened the new laws. 

Commenting on the EU Commission’s latest statement, cocoa expert Marc Donaldson, chief chocolate officer for the recently developed Oume Chocolate, who has spent four decades working in the sector, including a longstanding career with Barry Callebaut, expressed his concerns.

Marc Donaldson, of Oumé chocolate at the World Confectionery Conference in Brussels. Pic: Neill Barston

He said that there had been notable pressure from the EU that businesses had to be ready for the new legislation or risk breaking the law. He asserted that the EUDR IT platform had regularly crashed during testing last year, with proposed training having not been implemented that in turn led to the initial delay for the legislation.

He said: “Today, we find out that it will be delayed once more, with no thought to the millions of $$, that have been invested by the entire supply chain, from farmers to retailers, to say nothing about the 1,000’s and 1,000’s of tonnes of cocoa which have been contracted as EUDR compliant, with premiums of approx. 300 Euro/t , for work work that has already been actioned, but now may not be needed.

“This level of incompetence by the EU is truly at “Next Level”. They have misjudged almost every aspect of complexity of their own regulation. Responsibility must be apportioned, heads must roll, and funding put aside to pay back all the investment made.

“How can we explain this madness to the cocoa farmers around the world, who can ill afford either the time or the money to meet these demands.”