Lawmakers in the European Parliament and Council announced Thursday evening that they have reached a provisional agreement to simplify and delay the EU Deforestation Regulation (EUDR), a new law aimed at requiring companies to ensure that products imported to or exported from EU markets no longer contribute to deforestation and forest degradation globally.
As part of the agreement, the co-legislators also tasked the European Commission with reviewing impact of the new law early next year for potential further simplification, even before it will come into force.
The EUDR was introduced by the EU Commission in November 2021, and adopted in 2023, with the aim of effectively banning deforestation-linked products on the EU market, and establishing strong compliance requirements for companies providing or utilizing key commodities and products such as palm oil, beef, timber, coffee, cocoa, rubber and soy, in addition to some of their derived products, such as leather, chocolate, tires, or furniture.
The new regulation set rules for companies that place relevant products on the EU market, or export them, introducing mandatory due diligence rules, including a requirement to trace the products back to the plot of land where it was produced, to prove that the products were produced on land that was not subject to deforestation after 2020, and are compliant with all relevant applicable laws in force in the country of production.
The new deforestation regulation had initially been set to come into force at the end of 2024, but was delayed by a year at the request of the Commission to give companies more time to prepare for its compliance obligations. In September 2025, the Commission considered proposing a second one-year delay due to concerns regarding the ability of current IT systems to handle the data load created by the new regulation. In October, however, the Commission’s formal proposal retained plans to have the EUDR enter into force at the end of this year, but introduced a six-month enforcement grace period, and gave small enterprises until the end of 2026 to begin complying with the regulation.
The Commission’s new proposal also introduced a series of simplification measures into the EUDR regulation, shifting the focus of reporting obligations to the operators that actually place the relevant EUDR products on the market, while downstream operators such as retailers or manufacturers would no longer be obliged to submit due diligence statements, requiring only one submission, instead of multiple ones, in the EUDR IT system across the supply chain. For micro and small primary operators, the Commission’s new proposal reduced their obligation to submit only a simple, one-off declaration in the EUDR IT system, while if the information is already available, the operators would not have to take any action in the IT System themselves, replacing the previous need for regular submissions of due diligence statements.
In adopting their negotiating positions regarding the Commission’s proposals, however, both the EU Parliament and Council chose to push out the implementation of the new regulation by a year, with both legislative bodies agreeing to have the EUDR come into force at the end of 2026 for large companies, and in mid-2027 for smaller operators.
According to the EU Council, the new delay to the EUDR implementation was decided “following concerns from member states and stakeholders about the readiness of companies and administrations, as well as about technical issues related to the new information system.” Notably, several major companies in the sectors targeted by the EUDR, have warned against further delays and changes to the law which they said would introduce new uncertainties for companies, and unfairly punish businesses which had already invested in systems to comply with the new regulations.
The new agreement also introduces additional simplifications to the EUDR, placing the obligation to submit due diligence statements exclusively on the operators who first place the relevant products on the market, and having only the first downstream operator in the supply chain be responsible for collecting and retaining the reference number of the initial due diligence statement. The updated rules also ease compliance obligations for small and micro operators, requiring them to submit only a simple, one-off declaration in the EUDR IT system. The agreement also removes some printed products from the scope of the regulation, such as books, newspapers, and printed pictures from the scope of the regulation, due to their limited deforestation risk.
In addition to the delay and changes to the regulation, the new agreement also calls on the Commission to carry out a new simplification review of the EUDR by the end of April 2026 – even before the newly proposed implementation dates – to evaluate the administrative burden and impact of the regulation, which could open the EUDR to even further changes.
The new provisional agreement will now be required to be formally adopted by the EU Parliament and Council before entering into force, with the aim of the updated regulation being finalized before the end of the year.
Following the agreement, Parliament’s rapporteur Christine Schneider said:
“The heart of the EU deforestation regulation remains intact. We are protecting forests that face a real risk of deforestation, while avoiding unnecessary obligations in areas where no such risk exists. This agreement takes the concerns of farmers, foresters and businesses seriously and ensures that the regulation can be implemented in a practical and workable way.”
