There are no key legislative proposals in areas such as chemicals, animal welfare, and food systems in the 2024 work programme unveiled by the European Commission this week.
The EU executive has backtracked on its pledges made under the 2020 Chemicals Strategy for Sustainability, which has led to outrage among environmental campaigners who accused the Commission President, Ursula von der Leyen, of turning a blind eye to chemical pollution and human well-being.
It has also neglected other key proposals, such as a ban on caged farming, and the much-awaited law on sustainable food, which was once considered a "flagship initiative" of the Farm to Fork strategy.
Also, reforms to Regulation (EC) 1907/2006 on the Registration, Evaluation, Authorisation and Restriction of Chemicals (REACH), is one of the major proposals missing in the commission work programme. The revision, which was initially expected in 2022, was already delayed until the end of 2023 for political reasons, and now looks like it will be further delayed.
Covid-19, the energy crisis, Ukraine war, and the overall economic fallout have likely contributed to this delay. Nevertheless advocacy groups have blamed the commission for giving in to lobbyists, favouring industry interest over citizens.
Tatiana Santos, Head of Chemicals Policy at the European Environmental Burea, said: "The profits of the chemical industry are more important than the health of Europeans".
While REACH is widely seen as one of the strictest laws governing chemicals in the world, its revision was aimed at prohibiting groups of chemicals, instead of assessing substances individually, to fast-track restrictions over the most hazardous chemicals.
According to the European Environmental Bureau, it usually takes more than a decade for the EU and national authorities to spot toxic chemicals, and then another ten years to clamp down on their use.
EU commissioner Maroš Šefčovič, Commission Vice-President and Current EU Green Deal Chief, told MEPS: "Given the complexity of the file, it is possible that the REACH amendment will have to be taken forward in the next mandate".
However, experts argue that postponing its reforms creates legal uncertainty for businesses in the sector. Natacha Cingotti, an expert on chemicals from the Health and Environment Alliance, told the EUobserver: "The current uncertainties around the regulatory environment do not benefit any stakeholders, not even big companies, because they hurt the projection capacities of investors".
She said new evidence is consistently showing how "ineffective" the implementation of the current law is and how urgent it is to reform it.
"Delaying a protective and progressive reform of REACH would mean a missed opportunity for the EU to renew this leadership position".
Other legislation that has been dropped from the work programme includes the ban on non-essential uses of the most harmful chemicals in consumer products like toys, baby nappies, cosmetics, or food packaging.
It also lacks the widely-anticipated prohibition on exporting banned chemicals from Europe to other parts of the globe, a multimillion-euro business for some companies in Europe. Nevertheless they could be added at a later stage.
