Co-legislators fine-tuned the monitoring of environmental claims regarding future improvements to products during their second round of interinstitutional negotiations on the ‘Directive on Green Claims’ on Thursday, 24 April (see EUROPE 13628/3).
In the “compromise package agreed” upon during these discussions and consulted by Agence Europe, co-legislators specified, “Communication of future performance of a next version of a product on the product that is currently available on the market could be misleading to consumers by, for example, creating a false impression that the claimed attributes apply to the current product.”
The previous draft of the directive identified a growing trend among traders to promote a product’s future environmental performance. It was specified that these claims should be “substantiated”. Co-legislators added that such information may be considered a “misleading commercial practice”—“even if the information is factually correct”.
The European Commission proposed that the trader include a “time-bound commitment” and an “implementation plan” that would include “commitments for improvements”. (Original version in French by Florent Servia)