EU Traces deadline meets industry resistance

The European Commission has asked all upstream suppliers of kitchen waste including used cooking oil (UCO) to register with an online platform by 31 January, but is facing pushback from the biofuels market.

All overseas UCO suppliers should be registered under the Traces-New Technology (NT) system, which is the commission's platform certifying imports of animals, animal products, food and feed, and plants into the EU, according to a system notice issued on 1 December 2022. Authorities in the supplier's country of origin must approve and add suppliers to the Traces system, which many market participants think needs suppliers to obtain a veterinary certificate attesting that their cargoes are of entirely vegetable oil origin.

The commission said Traces-NT requirements do not represent a change to legislation governing imports of UCO into the EU. "If your exporter is authorised to export such goods to the EU, [it] should be listed in Traces as such via the official listing procedure... It would be up to your respective competent authorities in charge of certifying such exports to submit inside Traces the listing request for this operator. Once listed, that establishment will be able to continue its exporting activities," it said.

But industry organisations and large players have pushed back against the speed of implementation.

In a letter seen by Argus, the European Waste-based and Advanced Biofuels Association (Ewaba) has written on behalf of its members and Belgian-based economic operators to the commission to request a transition period of at least 24 months.

The letter says the registration of non-EU suppliers by the local authorities will take significant time as there are thousands of suppliers globally, which must be contacted and informed of the new requirements. It is "unclear which local authorities will be accepted by the different EU veterinary authorities in member states," it says, adding that there was no official notification regarding the changes.

The Belgian Petroleum Federation has co-signed the letter along with several major market participants, including agricultural commodities companies Cargill and Wilmar, UCO and waste collector Quatra, as well as the port of Antwerp-Bruges and the Belgian Biodiesel board.

By Lauren Moffitt and Daniel Mackay