The EU’s new deforestation regulations, which were set to come into effect at the turn of the year, may be postponed further, according to Environment Commissioner Jessika Roswall.
Jessika Roswall. Photo: Mikaela Landeström/TT
Brussels – the EU’s new deforestation regulations – primarily intended to reduce the destruction of rainforests – may be postponed once again.
The reason is IT problems, claims Environment Commissioner Jessika Roswall.
“We are concerned about the IT system due to the amount of information that needs to be processed. Therefore, we will request a postponement of one year,” said Roswall as she entered a meeting with the EU countries’ agriculture ministers.
At the same time, she dismisses that the postponement is due to criticism from the USA regarding the new regulations.
Originally, the regulations were supposed to come into effect on January 1 of this year, but were postponed for a year after protests from several developing countries and the right-wing parties in the EU Parliament.
The idea is that a range of products, such as coffee and cocoa, may only be imported into the EU if it can be proven that they were not produced on land where, for example, rainforest was cleared after 2021.
Critics argue that the law is unfair and leads to significantly increased administration costs. The forestry industry and various import companies in the EU have also been concerned about potential consequences and have received support from several EU member countries.
(September 23)
