On Tuesday 15 June, the European Commission published a four-week public consultation on its roadmap for revising EU legislation on plant reproductive material – plants and forests – for food, industrial, forestry and ornamental purposes.
The initiative, which is a proposal for a directive that would update existing legislation, is scheduled for the fourth quarter of 2022.
The institution stressed that the aim of the initiative was to remove barriers to the internal market and to support technical developments, to create sustainable and climate-resilient agri-food and forestry systems, to conserve biodiversity and to conserve plant and forest genetic resources.
In 2013, the Commission started a review process of the legislation by adopting a proposal for a Regulation on the production and marketing of plant reproductive material, including forest reproductive material (proposal MRF 2013). The proposal was withdrawn in 2015 once it had been rejected by the European Parliament in 2014.
The review will address the problems that have been identified. According to the Commission, the current legislation prevents innovation and the use of new technologies. as well as the adaptation of policy changes.
Comments from interested parties have been requested and they will be taken into account in the Commission’s preparations – preparations that the EU Council asked it to pursue last May.
The roadmap is open for comment until midnight Brussels time on 13 July. To participate in the consultation: https://bit.ly/35qww6v (Original version in French by Aminata Niang)