The regulation was originally scheduled to apply from Dec. 30 2024, before the Commission proposed delaying it to the end of this year, giving companies and trading partners an extra 12 months to get ready to comply with the new tracing and due diligence requirements.
But more time is needed, said Roswall, and the EU executive has now sent letters to the Council of the EU and the European Parliament proposing a further delay.
It’s the latest in a long string of actions by the Commission since late last year to weaken or delay green rules, part of a grand push to get rid of red tape and boost the global competitiveness of European industry.
The anti-deforestation rules, which target commodities such as coffee, beef, soy and palm oil, require companies to look deep into their supply chain to ensure these commodities hadn’t contributed to deforestation or human rights abuses. Some businesses claimed this information was often unobtainable.
The commissioner denied the Commission’s push to delay was linked to complaints from trade partners, such as the U.S., Japan or Malaysia. She also denied it was linked to the conclusion of thorny trade talks with Indonesia on Monday, the world’s largest exporter of palm oil.
Roswall kept the door open to tweaking the substance of the deforestation rules. “The other thing that we also have been working [on] for a long time is the simplification of different angles,” she said, which the Commission will “now also discuss with the ministers.”