Last week the EU Commission announced that the 'public consultation' phase of its Sustainable Products Initiative is now open. This begins the next step in the process, following the conclusion of the 'feedback period', which closed in November 2020.
More detail on what the Commission aims to achieve through this initiative is available in our earlier blog post highlighting the publication of the initiative in September of last year, available here. To recap, the initiative proposes to implement a number of the objectives established by both the EU Green Deal and the Circular Economy Action Plan, including to:
- broaden the scope of the Ecodesign Directive beyond energy-related products;
- establish additional legislative measures to make products placed on the EU market more sustainable; and
- address the lack of reliable information on sustainability along value chains, including through solutions such as digital passports and tagging.
The Sustainable Products Initiative is intended to be developed in close coordination with other initiatives established under the Circular Economy Action Plan, in particular the initiative on strengthening the role of consumers in the green transition (which is expected to be adopted by the Commission in the next few months).
Public consultation on the Sustainable Products Initiative is now open as of 17 March until 9 June 2021, and the online questionnaire can be accessed here. Following consultation, adoption of draft legislation by the EU Commission is currently planned for the fourth quarter of 2021.
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