EU Commission presents options to review the common seed legislation

Following a request from Member States in 2019, the Commission has published a study on the options to update the existing legislation on production and marketing of seed and other plant reproductive material.

The study summarizes that the (partly) decades old legislation is incoherent and not implemented in a harmonised way among Member States. It further notes that the existing legislation does not provide a good basis to introduce adapted testing requirements for the development of organic varieties suitable to organic production.

This is also one of the issues that IFOAM Organics Europe highlighted in the stakeholder consultation performed in the context of the study. Based on these and other assumptions, possible options to update the legislation are presented, two of which propose new amendments to the existing Directives.

We will provide you with a more detailed analysis of the different options in the next edition of this newsletter. Members can read it earlier on our member extranet.

For more information on the seed legislation and IFOAM Organics Europe’s work on this issue, please contact [email protected].

Please do note that we prioritise our members’ requests. For information about what you can gain from being a member, read our membership page and contact [email protected].