Market access will be denied for non-compliant companies in Germany
Dean Cogger, May 25th, 2021
Dean is EC4P's Managing Compliance Consultant helping companies identify their legal exposure to WEEE, Batteries and Packaging legislation and providing cost-effective and legally-robust compliance solutions.
On 15 April 2021, the Federal Environment Ministry in Germany passed an amendment to the ElektroG regulations (Germany’s Waste Electrical & Electronic [WEEE] regulations)
Notably, the amendment stipulates that retailers/distributors must only sell electronic products from manufacturers that are registered for WEEE with the German regulator, Stiftung EAR. This also applies to order fulfilment operatives whereby, the operatives may only fulfil orders from registered manufacturers. This increased level of legislative enforcement is designed to stop non-compliant companies having access to the market.
In addition to the aforementioned amendments, take-back obligations for retailers and operational requirements for ‘Authorised Representatives’ are also expanded upon.
The amendment is expected to take effect from 01 January 2022, with some short transitional periods applying.