EUDR for Rubber

The growing demand for natural rubber is leading to deforestation and ecosystem degradation. According to an academic study, over five million hectares of tropical forest, were cleared across Southeast Asia and sub-Saharan Africa for rubber plantations in the past 15 years.

The demand for rubber in the European market is mainly to manufacture tyres and consumes over a million tons of natural rubber every year but does not produce any of it, depending entirely on imports.

The production is mainly dominated by smallholder farmers. It is therefore challenging to ensure transparency and traceability due to the complicated supply chains.

With the new European Union Deforestation Regulation for Rubber, the selection of suppliers and raw material controls are premises to approach projects with a total guarantee from the beginning to the end.

EUDR for Rubber requires to certify a commodity as deforestation-free as follows:

• Do not produce on land that was deforested after 2020.
• Collect GPS data on the production area.
• Pass on pertinent information to the business partners.
• Respect land use and labor rights.

Producers, importers, and traders of the EUDR Rubber market need to ensure by a due diligence statement the risk of non-compliance is small following 3 steps:

• Collect evidence that the product is deforestation-free.
• Assess risks of non-compliance.
• If risks have been identified, take action to mitigate them.