Member States adopt deeply flawed position to gut the EU Deforestation Regulation

Posted on November, 19 2025

Today, EU Member States have presented a deeply flawed position on the European Commission’s proposal for the EU Deforestation Regulation (EUDR).

Member States have agreed to another one-year delay, further simplifications, and a review of the regulation even before it takes effect.

EU policy-makers flew to Belém to address the escalating climate crisis, while internally discussing how to hollow out EU climate laws. “Claims by Member States that ‘tackling deforestation remains a priority’ are a blatant distortion: they have just agreed to water down and delay the EUDR, disregarding both the regulation’s environmental purpose and the public money already sunk into it,” said Anke Schulmeister-Oldenhove, Manager for Forests at WWF European Policy Office. “With this vote, the EUDR is very close to becoming a theoretical thinking exercise rather than a concrete step towards zero deforestation”.

For a year now, governments have traded postponements, simplifications and exemptions, turning what was meant to be a landmark policy into a moving political target. The expectation was that the EU Member States would set a clear standard for deforestation-free supply chains. Instead, these lengthy political negotiations, paid for by taxpayers, have only created deep uncertainty in the business sector and resulted in another postponement proposal.

Next week, the European Parliament is set to vote on the European Commission’s proposal. WWF calls on policy-makers to reaffirm their commitment to implementing the EUDR without further delay or dilution.

EU policy-makers flew to Belém to address the escalating climate crisis, while internally discussing how to hollow out EU climate laws.