Europe must decide whether to cooperate strategically on the bioeconomy with other regions that may already be further along. That choice raises a number of hard questions - starting with the most basic one: is being a regulatory superpower still enough to win the race against China?
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Why European regulation evolves.
Insights is not a news feed. It gathers analytical essays on the long-term evolution of EU regulation, written to interpret trajectories rather than to report events. Each piece combines legal analysis, institutional reading, economic reasoning, and empirical evidence.
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Better Regulation
EmpCo Is Coming. The Clock Is Not Resetting.
EmpCo applies from 27 September 2026. With national transposition still uneven, businesses should review environmental claims, sustainability labels and durability information now.
Read the essay →MRL
What If Simplification Is Not Deregulation? Omnibus X and Pesticide MRLs
Omnibus X does more than streamline pesticide MRL procedures. It changes the evidence, objectives and territorial reach that may support stricter limits on imported food.
Read the essay →Food Law
Going bananas- The Difference that Makes the Difference in EU Novel Food
Three Article 4 outcomes on banana-derived foods show why EU novel-food status turns on the exact plant part, process, composition and use—not on the familiarity of the source alone.
Read the essay →Sustainable Food Systems
PPWR in Practice: What Businesses Need to Do Now
A practical guide to the PPWR: immediate obligations, manufacturer and supplier roles, documentation, transport packaging and the deadlines that follow.
Read the essay →Sustainable Food Systems
Biotech Act II Needs a Lab-to-Market Chapter for Food
Europe is building a policy for biotechnology and biomanufacturing. Unless Biotech Act II connects industrial scale-up to the food-law authorisation system, the route from European science to the European market will remain incomplete.
Read the essay →Better Regulation
Do No Significant Harm: The EU’s Next Major Environmental Principle?
The EU plans to apply a single Do No Significant Harm framework across its 2028–2034 budget. The decisive question is whether simplification can make DNSH a credible financial safeguard without reducing it to legal compliance or rebuilding a parallel authorisation regime.
Read the essay →Better Regulation
Why Agrifood Innovation Fears Uncertainty More Than Regulation
A global comparison of the cost, time and predictability involved in bringing agrifood innovation to market.
Read the essay →MRL
TFA and EU Food Safety Governance: Risk, Hazard and MRLs—All at Once
Within seven weeks, TFA has been hit from two different regulatory directions—one measuring dose, the other declaring hazard. Where they meet is where MRL policy gets decided.
Read the essay →Better Regulation
From Regulation to Reality: The Implementation Test for New Genomic Techniques
The EU has adopted its new framework for New Genomic Techniques, but its success will depend on clear evidence requirements, consistent Category 1 verification, proportionate Category 2 assessments, and workable EFSA and JRC guidance before application begins in 2028.
Read the essay →Regenerative Agriculture
The Future of Food Security—and What a Grey Swan and a Boiling Frog Can Teach Us
Compound droughts across the world’s major maize-producing regions are becoming increasingly likely. Biostimulants, organic fertilisers and biocontrols can help equip farming systems to absorb the growing climate shock.
Read the essay →CAP
With Europe’s Farm Workforce Going Missing, Everything Counts
Europe’s ageing and shrinking agricultural workforce may become a greater constraint on food production than land itself. Biostimulants, organic fertilisers, biocontrols and precision agriculture can help make every remaining input count.
Read the essay →Better Regulation
From Extraordinary Omnibus Packages to Continuous Regulatory Maintenance
COM(2026)380 is moving the EU’s Omnibus approach from extraordinary simplification packages toward continuous regulatory maintenance built around simplicity by design, planned review, digital tools and enforcement.
Read the essay →Sustainable Food Systems
Europe’s Innovation Problem Begins After Innovation
Europe excels at generating innovation but too often loses the commercial value abroad. The real test of the EU reform agenda is whether coherent, predictable and faster rules can keep scale-up, deployment and value chains in Europe.
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