Thousands of equipment manufacturers—who rely on tyres, seals and conveyor belts—are warning Brussels that the European Union’s signature Deforestation Regulation (EUDR) risks throwing complex supply chains into chaos and undercutting Europe’s competitiveness on the world stage.
That warning comes from the German Mechanical Engineering Industry Association (VDMA), which, in a formal plea to the European Commission and German Ministry of Agriculture, is pushing for a two-year postponement of the EUDR to allow Brussels to address “bureaucracy at its worst.”
Under the current timetable, large enterprises must begin complying on December 30, 2025, with small and midsize firms following on June 30, 2026. Yet the law obliges traceability for every product containing wood, rubber or leather—down to the precise plot of origin. For manufacturers who do not produce these raw materials but depend on them for critical components, the administrative burden is overwhelming.
“The high level of administrative burden generated by the regulation, both for companies in Europe and in third countries, as well as for the authorities, is bureaucracy at its worst,” VDMA President Bertram Kawlath wrote in a joint letter to the Commission and Germany’s Federal Minister of Agriculture. He warned that, left unamended, the EUDR “risks delivery disruptions and will erode the international competitiveness of European industry.”
Instead, the VDMA recommends easing compliance by restricting full-chain origin checks to first-tier distributors, introducing a de minimis exemption for small-volume shipments and low-content products, and excluding test samples, returned goods, and instruction manuals from the scope of the regulation. It is also urging Brussels to designate certain countries—particularly EU member states—as “safe origins,” thereby streamlining requirements for established, low-risk suppliers.
Wood Central understands these proposals were submitted during the Commission’s May 2025 consultation on Annex I of the EUDR and arrive amid at a time when Wood Central last week revealed that the newly ratified EU-Mercosur trade pact, which may include a “rebalancing mechanism” allowing Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay and Uruguay to challenge the regulation if it hampers their exports—clauses critics warn could further dilute the law’s impact.
Pressure is also mounting in Washington. During EU-U.S. trade talks, American negotiators are pushing Brussels to create a “negligible risk” category for U.S. timber products—a move exporters argue would simplify due diligence and avert threatened tariffs on roughly $3 billion of wood shipments to Europe.
As it stands, Brussels has already delayed the EUDR’s enforcement by one year—postponing its rollout from January to December 2025—with a Commission-commissioned study report earlier this year warning that any further delay could result in an additional 230,000 hectares of global forest being lost to deforestation.
- To learn more about the EUDR’s country classification scheme, click here for Wood Central’s special feature. And to understand why transhipment can muddy the waters on compliance and enforcement, click here for more information.
