It is an important step in the right direction, according to Tanja Gotthardsen, who is an anti-greenwashing specialist and member of one of the Danish Consumer Council Tænk’s Advisory Boards, which has closely followed the Danish and European legislation in the area. – In Denmark, we have stood still for several years, because there has been a complete absence of enforcement. It took me several years to find our legislation in the area, and it is after all from 2014. Still, nobody knew we had it, and while I was looking I could send envious glances in the direction of our neighboring countries, where it has been a big focus on the problem. In Denmark, legislation and enforcement have been absent until quite recently. She explains that it is precisely because of the lack of enforcement that Greenpeace reported Danish Crown to the police last year for greenwashing their so-called “climate-controlled pigs”. The Danish Consumer Ombudsman and the Danish Food and Drug Administration, which handle food-related complaints, have in recent years received a record number of complaints about greenwashing, but the cases often end up being out of date before they are resolved. – It says a lot about the system that Greenpeace has had to take the matter into its own hands, because otherwise the reports end up being out of date. But now there is finally clear hard power from the EU, she points out. It will cost Large businesses now face fines of four percent of their annual turnover – not just in one country, but potentially in all the member states in which they break the law. This part of national borders is important, explains Gotthardsen. She was involved in reporting the giant online fashion store Zalando for greenwashing in 2021. – Because Zalando is an online business registered in Germany, the Consumer Ombudsman considered that Denmark could not follow suit. With the new directive, the EU is now very clear about harmonizing the rules. An infringement in one EU country will also be an infringement in another. Now it is being streamlined, and there is really a great need for that. In the directive, the EU Parliament stipulates that, in future, businesses must, among other things, use approved certification schemes such as the EU flower (EU Ecolabel) as documentation. However, it is one of the areas Gotthardsen is skeptical about. – Certification schemes rarely take account of all links in the value chain. None of them make demands on whether it is actually a question of good products or the quantity produced. If you have to assess whether something is good or bad for the environment, or the climate more specifically, it is ultimately about the volume.
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“Sustainable, climate-neutral and environmentally friendly” – the EU takes up the fight against greenwashing
