- From 2025, a new EU law will require that products such as chocolate, coffee and frozen pizza do not contain any raw materials for which forests were cut down.
- The law also affects Swiss food producers who want to export their products to the EU.
- They demand that the Federal Council continue to guarantee access to the EU market – if necessary with adjustments to Swiss law.
- However, he wants to forego any adjustment to Swiss law for the time being.
Further clarification is needed, is the Federal Council’s bottom line on the question of how it will react to the new EU law. Specifically, what is needed to ensure that Swiss companies continue to have easy access to the European market should be clarified by the summer.
We can’t wait any longer or until the end of summer. Clarification and a solution are needed now.
For Urs Furrer, director of the Association of Swiss Chocolate Manufacturers, this is going on for too long. «We urgently need solutions and we cannot wait any longer or until the end of summer. We now need clarification and a solution.”
Exports worth four billion affected
Daniel Imhof, head of agriculture at the food company Nestlé, also calls for things to move forward. “It is important for us that we also have regulations in Switzerland that allow us to continue to export to the EU without customs hurdles.”
There is a lot at stake for the Swiss export industry with the new EU regulation. Exports worth a good four billion francs are affected by the EU deforestation regulation, as the Federal Council writes. And time is running out. From 2025 onwards, Swiss companies will have to prove that their products are not related to deforestation.
Doing all of this correctly would be difficult for companies without Swiss regulation, says Elisabeth Bürgi Bonanomi from the Center for Sustainable Development and Environment at the University of Bern. «EU regulations are fundamentally formulated somewhat complicated. If the Federal Council does not make it clear what exactly companies have to do to be compatible with the EU, then every company has to do it for themselves.
If the Federal Council does not clarify the EU regulations, then each company has to do this for itself.
The sectors could also set guidelines, but this does not have the same weight as a Swiss system, which is virtually equivalent to the EU system, Bürgi Bonanomi continued. Evidence that the products are deforestation-free would then have to be sent to the EU.
Central access to the EU information system
But that means that local food producers have access to the relevant EU information system, says Urs Furrer from the Association of Chocolate Manufacturers. “If Swiss companies do not have access to this information system by then, there is a risk of massive difficulties in market access to the EU.”
The new EU law means considerable additional work for companies. This is also one of the reasons why the Federal Council wants to refrain from adapting Swiss law for the time being. Such a change would also affect companies that do not export to the EU at all.