Blog

Navigating EUDR Part 2: Overtime

Posted on January 31st, 2025

By Devon Barker – Sustainability & Stakeholder Engagement

The ink has dried and it’s official, the European Union Deforestation Regulation (EUDR) has been delayed until December 30, 2025, or June 30, 2026 if you’re a small to medium enterprise. You may recall that the last time I wrote about navigating EUDR, I was reminded of an afternoon spent with a friend on his farm in Guatemala, listening to his observations of microclimate impacts and the changing landscape. Fast forward a few months and as coffee world grappled with how to implement the regulation, it was hard to escape the deluge of new services, sales pitches, and breaking news.

Brazil, Colombia, and Vietnam have led the way, implementing incredible surveying and verification systems at a scale never seen before—an achievement only made possible by the second space race we are currently witnessing.

But where does this leave the rest of the world’s smallholder farmers? Without assistance, they often find themselves caught in the widening technological and regulatory rift.

 

 

We just need the data points right?

“…what we need is another cow. The compost we make now is not enough to grow more food on the farm without more manure.”

This stark reminder of the gap came while I was standing in a small village surrounded by 33 members of a women’s coffee cooperative in the Nyamasheke district, Rwanda. Here, the supply chain revolves around farmers with one to two hectares of land, interplanting sustenance crops alongside coffee. These farmers often band together, selling coffee cherries to the closest processor—called a Central Washing Stations (CWS) in Rwanda—throughout the harvest, delivering cherries at various times and in different quantities as they ripen.

But it’s an open market (as of 2023 and the end of the coffee zoning mandates[i]), meaning farmers can work with any CWS they choose. The relationship between farmers and processors is built on mutual trust. Since processors aim to maintain quality and consistency, CWS often incentivize farmers to deliver coffee at optimum ripeness and provide technical assistance through quality premiums, agronomy training, composting programs, and more. This makes the CWS often the first point of contact for the data collection.

Supply chains built on this model—where hundreds or even thousands of farmers sell coffee to a single washing station—are common throughout East Africa. Digitizing these complex supply chains is both expensive and labor-intensive, requiring training, specialized equipment, and countless hours of fieldwork by technicians visiting each farmer[ii].

While large corporations can divert existing resources to make this investment, smaller organizations and individual farmers need more assistance. The extra time provided by the delay could be the difference between broader farmer inclusion and smallholders losing access to the EU market.

Many farmers in the coffee supply chain have historically lacked access to the tools or training necessary to meet stringent compliance requirements on their own[iii], now more than ever the industry must step up and act together to bridge the gap. The technological and logistical challenges brought to the forefront in the push for compliance by the end of 2024, have shown where we still need to put in the most work. The EUDR, acts as a double-edged sword: promoting environmental sustainability and a global commitment to reducing deforestation, but also highlighting the urgent need for support mechanisms to help farmers adapt to changing regulatory landscape.

 

 

Where we go from here.

There are four key actions we are advocating for to make the most of the extra time. Actions that will help everyone go into 2026 prepared.

  1. Follow through on assistance for coffee growers who lack access to the resources necessary to comply with the regulation’s technical demands.
  2. Establish clear pathways for coffee growers who have converted native forests to regain market access in the EU through reforestation or forest restoration programs.
  3. Promote interoperability and collaboration between the EU information system, third-party tools, and coffee-growing countries’ internal systems to eliminate duplication of efforts.
  4. Provide guidance from the EU on how sensitive information—such as farm locations—will be safeguarded from the point of entry into the EUDR registry through to the end consumer.

We can’t overlook the huge strides that have been made in preparation over the past year. The Federación Nacional de Cafeteros (FNC) in Colombia estimates they have geolocated 99% of coffee farms and obtained data consent from 73% of producers for inclusion in a national scale EUDR management system. Meanwhile Vietnam announced the launch of its EUDR Database System[iv] for the coffee sector and beyond, the Rwanda national Agricultural Export Development Board (NAEB) and the Ethiopian Coffee and Tea Authority (ECTA) collaborative preparation projects with the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP)[v], and Uganda invested nine million dollars[vi] registering and collecting data on farmers.

So how do we build on this momentum? We’re making the most of the year ahead by continuing to:

  • Work with the farmers and producers in understanding their needs and helping build their capacity to meet the requirements of the changing regulatory landscape. If we can help directly by providing expertise, training, tools, or connection to resources, we will.
  • Liaison with the institutions assisting in compliance efforts in every coffee producing country we source from, and advocate for unified systems and pre-competitive collaboration.
  • Bolstering our customer and internal tools to collect and maintain the integrity of required due diligence data while respecting the privacy of all.

Looking beyond the political drama that has muddied the proverbial coffee cup in the last few months, the delay has significant implications for stakeholders across the value chain. From coffee growers to roasteries, the breathing room provided by the extra time is an opportunity to ensure an equitable implementation[vii].

Want to chat about EUDR? Send us a message at: sustainability@cafeimports.com

 

 

Additional Resources and Reading.

[i] Brian Mertens Oirere Shem, “Rwanda Repeals Coffee Zoning Law to Spur Production,” STiR Coffee and Tea Magazine | Global Business Insight on Coffee and Tea, October 31, 2023, https://stir-tea-coffee.com/api/content/04ea3bfe-77b5-11ee-a05c-12163087a831/.

[ii] “Digitally Transforming Supply Chains in the Coffee Industry,” UNIDO, accessed January 22, 2025, https://www.unido.org/solutions/digitally-transforming-supply-chains-coffee-industry.

[iii] “Cracking Coffee Regulation: The Coffee Supply Chain Challenges with EUDR Compliance | 25, Issue 22,” Specialty Coffee Association, October 7, 2024, https://sca.coffee/sca-news/25/issue-22/cracking-coffee-regulation.

[iv] “Pilot of Forest-Coffee Plantation Database to Meet EU Standards Achieves Success,” vietnamnews.vn, accessed January 20, 2025, https://vietnamnews.vn/economy/1689190/pilot-of-forest-coffee-plantation-database-to-meet-eu-standards-achieves-success.html.

[v] “Combining EUDR Compliance and Sector Transformation in African Coffee,” UNDP, accessed January 20, 2025, https://www.undp.org/european-union/stories/combining-eudr-compliance-and-sector-transformation-african-coffee.

[vi] Natuur en Voedselkwaliteit Ministerie van Landbouw, “Uganda Wrestles with EUDR Compliance amidst Coffee Trade Challenges – AFRICA: Uganda – Agrospecials,” webpagina (Ministerie van Landbouw, Natuur en Voedselkwaliteit), accessed January 20, 2025, https://magazines.rijksoverheid.nl/lnv/agrospecials/2024/02/uganda.

[vii] “Delay to EU Deforestation Rules Must Help People Transition,” World Economic Forum, October 16, 2024, https://www.weforum.org/stories/2024/10/the-delay-to-eu-deforestation-rules-must-help-people-transition/.