German rubber industry calls for pause to new regulations

Frankfurt, Germany – German rubber manufacturers have called on the country's federal government to halt the ongoing wave of regulations to allow the industry to catch up with existing obligations.

"Quality must take precedence over quantity," Michael Klein, president of the German rubber industry association (WDK) commented in a statement issued 15 March.

The industry, Klein said, "needs at least the next three years" to implement existing regulatory obligations introduced under recent national and European legislation.

WDK, therefore, recommended that no new legal acts that bring about further documentation and verification should be enacted in Germany or the EU until 2027.

"We have to stop. We need to think and evaluate. And we definitely have to change course," Klein emphasised.

WDK went on to note that over the past four years, despite the global crises, new economic laws have emerged in various fields.

These areas, it said, include mobility, supply-chain, corporate financing, corporate social responsibility, carbon footprint evidence and chemicals-safety.

The implementation of such regulations, according to the rubber industry association, “is massively overburdening even the authorities.”

Ensuring compliance, noted Klein, requires extensive investment and additional costs to establish the right personnel and departments to carry out the required surveillance.

“Then there is often a lack of data, instruments, alternative substances, procedures and, in particular, the transitional periods to meet the new legal requirements for corporate verification,” he added.

Warning of “bureaucratic burnout”, Klein said the failure to implement the regulations would mean ‘discriminating’ against law-abiding domestic industry in favour of “uncontrolled competitors from unregulated regions of the world."