Commission publishes state of play on unfair trading practices rules for agri-food supply chain

Today, the Commission published the report on the state of play of the transposition and implementation of the unfair trading practices (UTPs) Directive, covering the 16 Member States that notified complete transposition to the Commission by July 2021. Adopted in April 2019, the Directive aims at protecting farmers, farmers organisations and other weaker suppliers of agricultural and food products against stronger buyers. The report shows that the 16 Member States generally followed the approach of the Directive. A majority of them went beyond the minimum protection level for farmers and small agri-food businesses established in the Directive. Most Member States have extended the Directive’s list of unfair trading practices (UTP) or made the prohibitions stricter. Member States generally follow the sectoral approach of the legislation and apply the requirements to the agri-food supply chain. When looking at the type of operators and the type of relationships affected by the legislative measures, the report notes that 14 Member States determined that the rules apply to relationships between suppliers and buyers of agricultural and food products at any stage of the supply chain. Regarding business size, all Member States, except two, refer to business size as a criterion for limiting the scope of application of the legislation. Most Member States chose to apply the rules to sale transactions in which either the supplier or the buyer, or both, are established in the EU, as set out in the Directive. Looking into the prohibited UTPs, all Member States used lists of prohibited practices and most of them followed the ‘black’ and ‘grey’ distinction. While distinguishing between the two, a few Member States moved one or more ‘grey list’ practices into the ‘black list’. Relatively more common is the adding of additional practices to the ‘black’ and ‘grey’ lists. The report gives an overview of the state of play of the transposition and implementation of the Directive on UTPs in business-to-business relationships in the agricultural and food supply chain. It covers the scope of application, the UTPs prohibited and the enforcement mechanisms chosen by Member States. More information is available here.