欧盟环境营销索赔新规——欧盟市场的日本公司需要知道什么

What Japanese Companies in the EU Market Need to Know April 2026 The EU is in the process of significantly strengthening its legal framework to address growingconcerns about misleading environmental marketing claims1, or “greenwashing”. While theproposed Green Claims Directive has stalled due to a lack of political backing, and is indefinitelypostponed, there is still a very important separate Directive on Green Claims that will becomelaw in September this year - it is called Directive (EU) 2024/825 on Empowering Consumers forthe Green Transition (“EmpCo Directive”2). Furthermore, determining whether a company’sexpressions comply with the EmpCo Directive can bechallenging. For example, the term “natural” is listedby the European Commission in recent guidance as apotential environmental claim. Determining whether“natural” constitutes a generic environmental claim(See 2.3 below), or a simple environmental claimis extremely difficult, as it requires considering thecontext in which the term is used. For instance, ifthe term appears alongside statements regarding thecompany’s philosophy, it is more likely to be judged asa simple environmental claim. However, even in suchcases, factors like the degree of closeness betweenthe “natural” expression and the statements about thecompany’s philosophy must also be considered. This new law will substantially reshape the way environmentalclaims3can be used in the Business-to-Consumer (B2C)channel. Japanese companies that sell products or provideservices, including digital services and digital content on theEU market, or that target EU consumers through advertising,online sales or branding, should be aware of these rules.Environmental claims that have until now been consideredacceptable may soon become unacceptable, and therebyexpose companies to heightened enforcement risks,penalties and reputational damage. 1.Practical Issues Regarding Compliancewith the EmpCo Directive While the EmpCo Directive has been viewed as asignificant issue within the EU, there appears to be aconsiderable gap in awareness with the level of concernamong Japanese companies. We wish to draw attentionto this point. Beyond the inherent difficulty in assessing compliancewith the EmpCo Directive, urgent action is required tocomply with it (See 2.5 below). Furthermore, variousrisks exist surrounding the EmpCo Directive (See 2.6 and2.7 below). Therefore, particular attention must be paidto ensuring compliance with the EmpCo Directive. First,Japanese companies engaging in commercialcommunications targeting consumers within the EUmust comply with the EmpCo Directive.Caution isneeded here, as some Japanese companies mistakenlybelieve that the EmpCo Directive does not apply to thembecause they have no branch within the EU. 2Background and Outline of the EmpCoDirective 2.1A Shift From General Consumer Law ToTargeted Greenwashing Rules We have encountered situations where statementscommonly used by companies were found to constituteclaims prohibited by the EmpCo Directive, surprisingour clients. Such seemingly innocuous expressionscan harbor pitfalls, demanding meticulous attention.Recently, we frequently observed numerous Japanesecompanies using expressions like “sustainability” ontheir websites. Even such commonly used terms requireprior analysis. The EmpCo Directive amends two cornerstoneinstruments of EU consumer law: the Unfair CommercialPractices Directive (UCPD) and the Consumer RightsDirective. The objective is to improve consumerprotection by ensuring that marketing claims relatingto environmental aspects of products and services areaccurate, transparent and verifiable. Historically, most environmental claims were assessedunder the “umbrella” provisions of the UCPD, whichprohibit misleading practices likely to distort the decisionof the average consumer when buying a product orservice. In practice, this required national authoritiesto carry out audits of suspected infringing behavior,and to demonstrate that a given claim had negativelyinfluenced consumer behavior. While effective intheory, this approach often placed a heavy evidentiaryburden on enforcement authorities and resulted inuneven application across EU member states. TheEmpCo Directive will attempt to address some ofthese enforcement shortcomings by introducing moreprescriptive rules and making it easier for enforcementauthorities to act if they suspect non-compliant behavior. (c)Misleading claims Claims that present an entire product, or anentire business as environmentally beneficialwhere, in reality, the claim relates only to aspecific component or activity.This would be thecase, for example, where a product is marketed asbeing made of “100% recycled plastic,” even thoughonly the bottle’s lid is manufactured from recycledmaterial. (d)Claims about carbon neutrality based ongreenhouse gas offsetting Claims about a product’s carbon neutrality based ongreenhouse gas offsetting are banned. Acceptableclimate-related claims on pro