EU lawmakers have reached a provisional deal to streamline the EU Deforestation Regulation (EUDR) and push its start date back by one year. The agreement responds to mounting concerns from companies, member states and supply-chain actors about readiness, administrative burden and unresolved IT issues.

The European Parliament and Council announced that the new arrangement would delay the regulation’s application to the end of 2026 for large operators and mid-2027 for smaller ones. The co-legislators also instructed the European Commission to conduct an early simplification review next year, ahead of the revised enforcement timeline. The EUDR aims to ensure that commodities entering or leaving the EU market are not linked to deforestation or forest degradation, covering products such as soy, palm oil, beef, cocoa, coffee, rubber and timber.

Under the updated framework, due diligence obligations will be consolidated. Only operators who first place EUDR-covered goods on the EU market must file due diligence statements, while the first downstream operator will simply retain the reference number. Small and micro operators will be required to submit only a single, simplified declaration. In addition, several printed items, including books and newspapers, have been removed from the scope due to their low deforestation risk.

The postponement follows industry warnings that existing IT systems could not support the expected data load and that a rushed rollout would create uncertainty, particularly for companies that had already invested in compliance. Nevertheless, some major firms had urged policymakers not to weaken the regulation’s core objectives. Parliament rapporteur Christine Schneider welcomed the outcome, saying the agreement protects forests while ensuring workable rules for farmers, foresters and businesses.

The EUDR was first proposed in 2021 in response to global forest loss driven by agricultural expansion, with the EU long recognized as a major market for deforestation-linked commodities. Its final adoption is expected before the end of the year.