- The President of the EU Commission hints at changes to the EUDR to be released this week
- MEP Greens and NGOs push back, but still can’t deal with smallholders
- Is Reuters most recent hit-piece against palm EU-funded?
Hints from the President
Late last week it was reported that Commission President Ursula Von Der Leyen would make announce changes to the EUDR within the next week. Euractiv reported that “she would propose either a postponement or another temporary solution within days”, according to EPP agriculture spokesperson Herbert Dorfmann. Similar comments were reported across a number of news outlets, including the Financial Times.
Pressure to make changes has been growing from many quarters, but they stepped up last week with the additional intervention of Manfred Weber, who is President of the EPP within the European Parliament. Weber has been a key figure in pulling back some of the Commission’s plans on the Green Deal over the past 18 months, with a clear agenda leaning towards industry and agriculture.
At the same time, other voices have added to the opposition, notably Italian and German leather producers, indicating that industry has “woken up” to the additional costs of the regulation that stretch well beyond the farm gate and into Europe’s industrial heartlands.
What is significant here — as it is with the paper industry — is the competitiveness of European goods within Europe and on global markets Consider the following: a European shoe producer’s leather hide costs will go up, but a similar producer in the US, China or India will not face the same price rises on inputs. The result? European shoe production becomes less competitive.
This is somewhat at odds with the approach taken by the President on the bloc’s competitiveness, which was underlined by the recent Draghi Report — itself part of a VDL-backed narrative to make a case for changes to stifling regulations.
The pushback on the backlash …
Green groups and MEPs supportive of the EUDR aren’t taking this lying down. At the end of last week, the Socialists and Democrats (S&D) and Greens groups within the European Parliament wrote to the President also, imploring her to stay the course with the EUDR.
But, talk to any industry or political insider in Brussels and they’ll tell you that this is close to impossible. The fact remains that the ‘Guidelines’ that have been promised for months are still not completed, despite what the Directorate General of the Environment has said. It’s also well-known among European industry that the draft guidelines that were circulating earlier this year were developed with zero industry consultation, let alone international consultation.
Similarly, NGOs have written about the need to “stand firm,” blaming self-interested corporations. But there are two clear faults in the pushback.
First, a bad and unworkable regulation is still bad and unworkable, no matter how good its intentions are — and it doesn’t help that the Commission is running well behind on its implementation timeline.
Second, the issue of smallholders is still not being dealt with. The promise of a paltry EUR70 million to assist with impacts — the bulk of which is likely go to European NGOs — is token at best.
Is the EU funding the anti-palm machine again?
The Greens-NGO push in Europe underlines a view in developing countries that this is protectionism masquerading as environmental protection, and that the EU cares little for economic development among its trading partners.
This view is further underlined in a recent article that appeared on a Reuters website, which was a broadside at Indonesia’s palm oil industry.
The article blames palm oil — wholesale — for everything from climate change to biodiversity destruction, and questions the impact of the palm oil moratorium and Indonesia’s lower rates of deforestation. Myths that have been debunked on numerous occasions.
The analysts at CSPO Watch have published a scathing critique of the piece, and also called out Reuters for violating their integrity principles in publishing the piece.
But there’s an additional question that needs to be asked: was this palm oil hit-piece funded by the European Union?
The journalist behind the piece has been funded by Journalism Fund EU, which itself received funding from the European Commission. And that has resulted in anti-palm stories. And the call for grants for the fund, paid for by the Commission, highlights that stories should basically compare European environmental standards with those in other countries.
This reads more like advocacy than journalism. In other territories such as the US, this would be subject to ‘foreign influence’ funding rules.
We’ll have more on this story over the coming weeks.