European Parliament votes through further EUDR delay, amid revisions to due diligence laws

Major concerns have been expressed by environmental groups at a decision by the European Parliament to vote through an additional year’s delay on top of an already agreed year-long postponement of its flagship EUDR deforestation legislation, reports Neill Barston.

The frameworks, which had been adopted in 2023, had been due to come in at the end of 2024, have centred on delivering action on climate change through ensuring European companies are legally responsible for ensuring their supply chains – including in commodities such as cocoa, palm oil and soy, are not linked to forest loss

Significantly, the additional delay comes as parallel discussions on several strands of linked corporate due diligence legislation aiming to deliver social and human rights protections within the same trading systems.

But following intense lobbying from EU centre-right political groups, as well as some quarters of industry including some major snacking and confectionery groups, the landmark laws have now been put back significantly again over two years on from its initial announcement.

As previously reported by Confectionery Production, a letter from major industry players calling for the legislation had been sent to the European Commission and parliament, signed by groups including Barry Callebaut, Ferrero, Nestle, Tony’s Chocolonely, Olam and organisations including Rainforest Alliance, had all argued that adding yet further delays created additional uncertainty in the process.

Rejection of Commission advice
However, the EU Parliament rejected the EU Commission’s final recommendation (after initially its ministers had implied that a delay was inevitable due to IT systems not being ready), to go ahead with the policy as previously agreed at the end of this month.

The vote on the decision for a second year of delays was achieved in a coalition of the centre-right and right wing groups within the parliament, with 405 votes in favour of putting the process back, with 242 in favour of proceeding now, and with 8 abstentions.

Subsequently, the EU parliament confirmed that companies will have an extra year to comply with the rules. This in effect means larger companies of 500 employees or more  will have to apply the regulation from 30 December 2026, and small operators – private individuals and enterprises with under 50 employees and an annual turnover related to the products concerned of less than €10 million – from 30 June 2027.

According to the parliament, this would ‘enable time to  guarantee a smooth transition and to allow time to improve the IT system that operators, traders and their representatives use to make electronic due diligence statements,” 

There has also been much made of what some considered a ‘burden on smaller companies’ – yet the original EUDR regulations had essentially always been devised in a proportional manner.

However, under the latest decision, small businesses  will now only have to submit a one-off simplified declaration, making it easier for businesses to comply with the law without compromising on its objectives.

Crucially, one element of yesterday’s vote included an insistence that the EU Commission provide a report to assess the impact and administrative burden on the laws for smaller companies – which has already drawn criticism from many observers, as the laws would not have been introduced. This has led many environmental groups to express concerns that political groups will seek to weaken the regulations even further under a guise of simplification.

Commenting on the decision, Mighty Earth non governmental organisation asserted the importance of delivering the legislation.

It said: “Although deeply alarming that the clock has paused again on the legislation, the commitment to ending deforestation in global commodity supply chains must not.

“The world is witnessing catastrophic weather events which are being made much worse by deforestation. We need standing forests to protect people and nature from landslides and flooding.

“EUDR enforcement is necessary and inevitable, even with the 12-month delay. The EU must use this second postponement to build back better and ensure a robust and strong law is ready to go at the end of next year. Ending deforestation is critical to avoiding further catastrophic events.”

Furthermore, global research organisation, the World Resources Institute, also voiced its concerns.

Its Vice President and Director for WRI Europe, Stientje van Veldhoven, commented: “We’re losing 18 football fields of forest every single minute, with cascading harm to nature, the climate and the economy. It is deeply sad to see the EU water down and postpone its deforestation law – at the very moment forests and businesses need strong, predictable rules to stop deforestation.”

Corporate due diligence laws revisions
Linked directly to the EUDR are several major due diligence laws affecting all businesses across Europe in the pipeline, namely the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD), and Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive (CSDDD), which provide vital social and human rights protections that are integral to raising overall standards.

These have also seen intense debate across the political spectrum, with the EU Commission proposing an “Omnibus” package of simplification of these key rules – which many companies, including Ferrero (see our interview with Francesco Tramontin below, are in danger of being weakened further if the agreements are altered notably beyond their present incarnation. 

For its part, global Wildlife organisation, the WWF expressed concerns that EU Parliament decisions this week have also sought to revise these core pieces of legislation will see these frameworks further weakened.

As the group noted, the process of delivering its Omnibus package which began earlier this year had in its view been ‘defined by urgency’ and, noted that European Ombudsman that the reviews of the due diligence laws had been impacted by ‘maladministration’ and lack of evidence.

Mariana Ferreira, Sustainable Finance Policy Officer at WWF European Policy Office, said: “This outcome reflects a troubling trend in the European Parliament, where the conservative bloc has increasingly aligned with far-right agendas, legitimising polarising demands and pushing aside science-based evidence and warnings.” 

In a Linkedin post on the issue, the WWF highlighted the situation with a striking graphic showing what the due diligence frameworks looked like last year – depicting half of a horse that was well defined and accurately drawn, placing it alongside its corresponding half with an image of poorly sketched, unclear front portion of the animal to represent the uncertainty of where these policies now stood. 

Sebastien Godinot, Senior Economist at WWF European Policy Office, concluded: “Under the guise of easing regulatory burdens, the EU engaged in a race to the bottom, rushing to undo necessary safeguards that were set in place to protect our nature and climate, as well as to secure future economic prosperity. Instead of focusing on the successful implementation of the laws, decision-makers shifted their focus to short-term political gains, ignoring the strong evidence showing that corporate climate targets are not only feasible, but make a lot of sense for companies.”