On Monday 17 September, the Austrian presidency of the Council of Ministers of the EU presented a new compromise text to the delegations on the proposal to strengthen measures against unfair trading practices (UTP) in the food supply chain (see EUROPE 12093).
The text was welcomed by experts of the Special Committee on Agriculture (SCA) but some elements still pose a problem.
The presidency suggests the scope of the text proposed by the European Commission should be kept as it is while some countries advocate extending it to a number of players. The Visegrad Group (Poland, Hungary, Czech Republic and Slovakia) + 4 (Bulgaria, Croatia, Romania and Slovenia) has put forward ideas aimed at enlarging the scope to buyers.
With regards the “burden of proof” (Article 3(2a)), the presidency proposes at this stage to delete such terms from the provisions of the text.
Finally, it suggested that the definition of “perishable products” should be modified and made a number of supplementary changes to the text.
The Austrian presidency plans to discuss the matter again at the SCA on 1 October, when it trusts it will be able to obtain a mandate from the Council to begin negotiations with the European Parliament. (Original version in French by Lionel Changeur)