New EU rules that would likely pile more red tape on farmers, including potentially requiring beef farmers to submit geotagged photos of cattle on farm, have been postponed again.
European Commissioner for the Environment Jessika Roswall announced on Tuesday the EU deforestation regulation was being put back for a year because of the impact it would have on supply chains.
“We have also during the last year tried to focus on simplification from different angles, but with that said, we also know that despite our efforts when it comes to simplification, we still believe that we cannot really get [this in] without disruption for our businesses and our supply chains.
“We have concern regarding the IT system, given the amount of information that we put into the system.
“That is why we will seek, with the co-legislators, postponement with one year. That will of course also give us time to look at the different risks, [how] this load of information will get into the system,” she stated.
Commissioner Roswall said the EU is still very committed to fighting deforestation and rejected claims that the postponement was linked to a US-EU trade deal.
She added that she will now seek a one-year delay to the regulation’s implementation and will also discuss with the European Parliament how the rules can be simplified.
Background
The deforestation regulation was last postponed in late 2024, when D-day for its implementation had been scheduled for 30 December.
The regulation was agreed at EU level in 2023 and aims to prevent products being placed on the EU market or exported from EU countries which contributed towards deforestation or degradation of forests.
The law covers nine commodities, including cattle and soya, for which proof would have to be provided that raw materials did not come from deforested land.
Confusion has surrounded how the law will be implemented, particularly whether or not beef farmers would have to submit geotagged photos of cattle at the point of sale to fulfil due diligence requirements.
ICMSA
Chair of the Irish Creamery Milk Suppliers’ Association (ICMSA) livestock committee Michael O’Connell welcomed the law’s deferral, but said it needs to be taken off the table altogether.
“Obviously [the] ICMSA had rejected the frankly silly proposal that farmers selling an animal would have to produce a DDS [due diligence statement] confirming that the animal had not come from any land that had been subject to deforestation since 2020.
“As if that wasn’t administratively clumsy enough, the seller was also going to have to produce X-Y coordinates of the land on which the animal had been raised. This is just the latest blatant contradiction of the so-called simplification agenda,” he said.
The livestock chair said information on the location of farms is already with the EU and slammed the proposed approach.
“They already have this information; they already have all the data and coordinates of any individual farmers’ farm.
“But rather than look up their own records, they make the farmers go through yet another laborious submission process where, for the umpteenth time, he or she will have to supply information and confirm details that they have already submitted annually for years.
“Why doesn’t the Commission look up its own records instead of asking us to submit all that information again? Why is their time so much more important than ours? They have all the resources, all the data and the latest IT systems, but seemingly just couldn’t be bothered,” he said.
Addressing the Mercosur trade deal, O’Connell questioned what due diligence statements will be required for south American beef.
“Their whole sectors are based on deforestation and the same Commission wants to import [almost] 100,000t of their beef per annum into the EU,” he added.
The livestock chair added that the current deforestation regulation should be taken off the table and new rules that address deforestation properly should be put in place.
SHARING OPTIONS