Chief of Federation of Austrian Industries, Christoph Neumayer and Chamber of Commerce chief Wolfgang Hattmannsdorfer, called on the EU executive to roll back Green Deal regulations in its ongoing war on red tape, while the European insurance industry lobby has also weighed into the debate.
Austria’s leading trade and industry bodies have called on European Commission top brass to revisit a swathe environmental laws adopted under the flagship Green Deal of president von der Leyen’s first EU executive, in letters seen by Euronews.
The Corporate Sustainability and Due Diligence Directive (CSDDD) was welcomed by unions and green groups last year after a fraught debate among governments and EU legislators, and requires businesses operating in Europe to demonstrate there is no environmental or human rights violations in their supply chains outside the EU.
The CSDDD “must either be significantly simplified or dismissed altogether”, the head of the Federation of Austrian Industries, Christoph Neumayer, said in a letter to economy commissioner Valdis Dombrovskis, dated 6 February and co-signed by the head of the Austrian Federal Economic Chamber, Wolfgang Hattmannsdorfer.
Hattmansdorfer is currently leading fractious coalition talks for the Austrian People’s Party, which came second to the far-right Freedom Party in general elections last September, and has even been tipped as its next leader.
“In order to maintain competitiveness, we see a further urgent need for simplification in numerous legal acts of the Green Deal,” they wrote, specifying an incoming border tax (CBAM) based on the carbon footprint of a range of imported goods and the Deforestation Regulation – already delayed in a process spearheaded by Vienna.
