The Polish Chamber of Commerce of Furniture Manufacturers has appealed to Minister of Climate and Environment Paulina Hennig-Kloska for the urgent preparation of practical training for businesses on the implementation of the EU EUDR regulation. The board of the Chamber stresses that furniture companies must not be left alone with one of the most demanding regulations of recent years.
The new rules on preventing deforestation will soon impose a range of obligations on businesses, including documenting the origin of wood, geolocation, data archiving and due diligence systems. The problem is that companies still have not received clear and practical guidelines on how to fulfil these obligations in practice.
“The furniture industry is not afraid of ‘ecology’ or responsible sourcing of raw materials. Polish furniture manufacturers have operated in accordance with high environmental standards for years and fully understand the need to protect forests and build transparent supply chains. The problem is not the objective of the EUDR regulation itself, but the interpretative chaos currently accompanying its implementation. Businesses still do not know how to fulfil the obligations arising from the new rules in practice. Companies are referred back to the text of the regulation, but no one is able to clearly explain how specific requirements should be interpreted and implemented in everyday business operations. Companies need practical guidelines, examples, clear interpretations and information on how to prepare procedures and documentation in order to operate legally and avoid sanctions,” emphasises Krzysztof Zimny, Member of the Council of the Polish Chamber of Commerce of Furniture Manufacturers.
According to the Chamber, the current information chaos surrounding EUDR is causing growing frustration among entrepreneurs, who complain about widespread misinformation. The market is being flooded with commercial training courses, often based on incomplete interpretations or focused mainly on frightening businesses with sanctions. Meanwhile, there is a lack of official, practical communication from the institutions responsible for implementing the regulation.
What is at stake is the security of one of the most important branches of the Polish economy. Poland has for years been among the world’s largest producers and exporters of furniture, while the entire sector provides jobs for hundreds of thousands of people and is one of the pillars of national exports.
“Today, the biggest problem for the furniture industry is not the idea of forest protection itself, but the lack of legal certainty. Businesses want to comply with the regulations, but they cannot operate in a reality where, instead of clear guidelines, they receive contradictory interpretations, assumptions and commercial training courses based more on ideologising the subject than on practical knowledge. It is difficult to expect companies to take responsibility for implementing regulations that even experts often cannot interpret unambiguously. After all, we are talking about an industry that is a showcase of the Polish economy and one of the global leaders in production and exports. Such a strategic sector should now receive real support from the state, not only obligations and the risk of sanctions. In addition, in the draft national act, we see signs of gold-plating,” notes Krzysztof Zimny, referring to gold-plating, meaning the expansion of national regulations beyond EU requirements.
In its letter to the Ministry, the Chamber appealed for practical training to be prepared and conducted by experts from the Ministry of Climate and Environment and representatives of the authorities responsible for inspecting companies in the area of EUDR. According to businesses, only such a solution can ensure a uniform interpretation of the regulations and reduce the risk of discrepancies that could lead to sanctions in the future.
The Chamber emphasises that there is less and less time for companies to prepare, while the date on which the new rules will begin to apply is approaching very quickly. It is therefore necessary to immediately launch a genuine dialogue with the furniture industry and provide businesses with the practical knowledge they need to operate safely on the European market.
Source: CEO.com.pl
