“US paper industry asks Trump to seek lighter EU deforestation rules”

The U.S. paper and pulp industry is lobbying President Donald Trump's administration to ask the EU to declare the United States deforestation-free, a step that could make it easier for exporters to meet the bloc's new environmental rules.

From December, the European Union's anti-deforestation policy will ban imports of commodities linked to forest destruction. Brussels already delayed the policy's launch by a year following complaints from trade partners including Brazil, Indonesia and the Biden administration in the United States.

"A delay does not solve our concerns with the regulation's complex requirements and significant technical barriers," Heidi Brock, CEO of the American Forest and Paper Association (AF&PA), told Reuters, saying the EU law would impose "costly and unnecessary obligations" on U.S. companies.

"We are urging President Trump and his trade advisors to include this on the list of items to negotiate with the European Union to ensure the U.S. is recognised as a country that wisely manages its forest resources and must be recognised as not contributing to deforestation," Brock said in emailed comments.

That goes beyond a call by Trump's nominee to run the Commerce Department…to be classed as "low-risk" - the EU policy's least-stringent level…

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