Update 18th March 2024: the Council of the EU gave its final approval on the Critical Raw Materials Act, meaning the Regulation is adopted and will be published in the Official Journal of the EU, entering into force on the twentieth day following this.
Today, after several weeks of negotiations between the European Commission, the European Parliament and the Council of the EU, the bloc’s leaders came to an agreement on the final new EU Critical Raw Materials Act, the Regulation originally proposed by the European Commission in March 2023. The news laws are disappointing for people and planet with a lack of clear targets for reducing demand, lack of respect for Indigenous rights (no Free, Prior & Informed Consent – MEPs had voted this in but it was deleted in negotiations), and a reliance on weak certification schemes. There had been high hopes for MEPs to make significant improvements to the file, however they did not, and more was lost in the negotiations.
Read our reaction with the NGOs’ Raw Materials Coalition here.
