Pecohub This week, the UK Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) launched a consultation on proposed supply chain due diligence regulations to address illegal deforestation. The regulations would apply to coffee, cocoa, cattle, soy, oil palm, rubber and timber, as well as derived products. The consultation, including the Government’s proposal, is discussed in this post.
The UK already has somewhat of a framework for addressing illegal deforestation.
- The UK Timber Regulation, adopted in 2013, prohibits placing illegally harvested timber and timber products on the market in Great Britain.
- In 2021, the UK introduced primary legislation to address illegal deforestation by regulating the use of forest risk commodities. Schedule 17 of the Environment Act 2021 provides the framework for prohibiting the commercial use of forest risk commodities unless they were produced in compliance with relevant local laws.The Environment Act establishes three core requirements: (1) a prohibition on using illegally produced forest risk commodities – relevant local laws must be complied with in relation to the commodity, (2) a requirement to establish and implement a due diligence system – i.e., a system for identifying and obtaining information about the commodity and assessing and mitigating the risk of non-compliance with relevant local laws relating to the commodity, and (3) annual reporting on the due diligence system. Secondary legislation is needed to implement this framework.
- In addition, the EU Deforestation Regulation will apply in Northern Ireland, starting at the end of this year.
As we wrote about during the summer, on June 23, the UK Government announced that it intends to introduce deforestation regulations under Schedule 17 of the Environment Act. It laid out the proposed regulations in broad strokes in a contemporaneous policy paper. Defra has indicated that implementing regulations are expected to be delivered in 2027. In addition to implementing Schedule 17 of the Environment Act, those regulations will update requirements under the current UK Timber Regulation.
