Civil society organisations deeply regret that the much needed revision of the Sustainable Use of Pesticides Directive (SUD) is being postponed and ask the European Commission to officially present a new publication date within the briefest delays. The publication should take place at the latest by the end of May.

The pesticide industry lobby group CropLife Europe (CLE) and their allies have staged an immense and well-resourced lobby campaign against the flagship-policy of the EU: the Farm to Fork and Biodiversity strategy (both pillars of the EU Green Deal). On behalf of agrochemical multinationals, CropLife organised a fierce attack on the EU's ambition to protect ecosystems and public health by reducing pesticide risk and use by 50% by 2030 (1).

In order to tackle the grave threat of the biodiversity crisis, the EU will table a proposal for targets for the reduction of pesticide use. This has put the pesticide industry into survival mode. A new leaked document from pesticides lobby group CropLife Europe shows that while it talks a big talk about backing the Green Deal, in reality it is employing a wide variety of lobbying tactics to undermine ambitious, binding targets.

In the latest episode of EU Watchdog Radio, we discuss the European Guarantee Fund (EGF), a secretive €25 billion fund created by the European Investment Bank (EIB), ostensibly to help European businesses in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Over 40 NGOs and trade unions working on transparency, media, democracy and digital rights, asked EU policy-makers this morning to make urgent improvements to the transparency of the trilogue negotiations on the Digital Markets Act (DMA) and the Digital Services Act (DSA), two crucial new EU regulations or so called Digital Services pack.

Today over 40 NGOs and trade unions working on transparency, media, democracy and digital rights, asked EU policy-makers to make urgent improvements to the transparency of the trilogue negotiations on the Digital Markets Act (DMA) and the Digital Services Act (DSA).

The European Ombudsman has re-opened an inquiry on how the European Commission (EC) has dealt with transparency requests by lobby watchdog Corporate Europe Observatory (CEO) for public access to documents concerning the negotiations for the procurement of COVID-19 vaccines. Despite promises made by the Commission last year, the negotiations are still shrouded in opacity and instead of improvement there now seems to be a regression. After a complaint by CEO in January Emily O'Reilly, European Ombudsman, wrote a letter to the Ursula von der Leyen, President of the European Commission, expressing

As the European Parliament prepares to vote this Thursday on the Digital Services Act (DSA), new research by CEO shows that intense corporate lobbying by Big Tech contributed to the EU co-legislators abandoning their original call for a phase out to a ban of surveillance advertising (involving intensive user tracking and profiling). This week’s vote is crucial as it provides a final opportunity for the Parliament to reverse this position before it starts trilogue negotiations with Council and Commission.

Despite the EU's talk about regulating the digital sphere, we uncover how Big Tech has successfully waged a major lobbying campaign to prevent a ban on their extremely profitable model of intrusive surveillance advertising. However MEPs still have a chance to turn some of this around.

A Presidency prepared in close collaboration with the French corporate sector which is setting a policy agenda that strongly reflects business demands.That is the verdict of Corporate Europe Observatory and Observatoire des multinationales in their new report “Under the influence: the distorted priorities of the French EU Council Presidency”, published today, in the run up to the start of the French Presidency on 1 January.