On 21 October 2026 the European Commission, through its Directorate-General for Environment, opened a public consultation on bio-based feedstock in plastic packaging under Article 8 of Regulation (EU) 2025/40, the Packaging and Packaging Waste Regulation (PPWR). The consultation stays open until January 13, 2027. EU packaging manufacturers and converters, bio-based plastics producers, raw-material suppliers of bio-based feedstocks, food-contact packaging businesses, brand owners placing packaged goods on the EU market and retailers placing packaged goods on the EU market must submit evidence-based feedback by January 13, 2027, and assess how possible future bio-based content targets and sustainability requirements under PPWR Article 8 would affect packaging formulations, sourcing and supplier contracts. No fine, market ban or rejected filing attaches to a missing response.
The Commission notice of 21 October 2026 points respondents to Have Your Say initiative 19498, "Plastic packaging containing biobased feedstock: EU rules", and to the EUSurvey form PPWRArt8. The notice adopts no target, no sustainability criterion and no delegated act. Article 8 already requires the Commission to review the technological development and environmental performance of bio-based plastic packaging and to assess whether further measures are needed. This consultation is the evidence file for that review.
What does the PPWR Article 8 consultation ask?
The consultation asks for views and evidence on the role of bio-based plastics in packaging policy. It is not a compliance filing, and it does not change an obligation that already applies.
The Commission will use the results, with the Strategic Framework on a Competitive and Sustainable EU Bioeconomy, to assess technological development and environmental performance. The questions cover market-demand measures and targets for bio-based feedstock in plastic packaging, a possible link to sustainability requirements, environmental impacts, sourcing, recycling technologies and trade-offs. The notice publishes no draft percentage, no mass-balance rule and no list of eligible feedstocks. The Commission may develop a legislative proposal. It does not commit to tabling one, and it sets no date for one.
| Item | What the 21 October 2026 notice states |
|---|---|
| Instrument | Article 8 review under Regulation (EU) 2025/40 (PPWR) |
| Opened | 21 October 2026, Directorate-General for Environment |
| Closes | January 13, 2027 |
| Legal effect | Evidence gathering. A legislative proposal is possible, not adopted |
| Languages | English first; other EU official languages to follow |
Who on the EU packaging market is exposed?
The actors who would have to reformulate or re-source if a later proposal set a content target are EU packaging manufacturers and converters, bio-based plastics producers, raw-material suppliers of bio-based feedstocks, food-contact packaging businesses, brand owners placing packaged goods on the EU market, and retailers placing packaged goods on the EU market. The Commission also invites citizens, NGOs, public authorities, recyclers and research organisations. Recyclers are named for evidence on recycling technologies. Food-contact businesses are named separately because a content rule and an existing food-contact file are not the same dossier.
What should those actors prepare before January 13, 2027?
By January 13, 2027 the useful submission is evidence the Commission can use in the Article 8 assessment: availability and performance of bio-based feedstocks, environmental impacts, sustainability of sourcing and production, and the effect of possible targets on formulations and contracts.
- Map plastic packaging placed on the EU market that already uses bio-based feedstock, with feedstock type, polymer share and supplier.
- Collect supplier evidence on sourcing and production sustainability, and mark the contract clauses a future requirement would reopen.
- Record how those grades are sorted and recycled, including any technology limit the plant already sees.
- For food-contact lines, note which grades sit under an existing food-contact file and which would need a new assessment if a content target were proposed.
- File that evidence on the Have Your Say consultation for initiative 19498, or on the EUSurvey form PPWRArt8, before January 13, 2027.
- Name an owner for any later Commission proposal. Article 8 sets no date for it.
Continuous per-jurisdiction monitoring surfaces a Commission consultation of this kind the moment it is published, and a later proposal if the review produces one.
What happens if a company does not respond?
The notice, the consultation page and Article 8 as the Commission describes them impose no fine, no market ban and no rejected filing on a company that stays silent. Non-response is not a breach of Regulation (EU) 2025/40.
The Commission will assess opportunities, limitations and trade-offs from the evidence it receives, and it may then propose a framework to drive bio-based feedstock in plastic packaging. Actors who file nothing leave that assessment to competitors, recyclers, NGOs and public authorities. PPWR duties on recyclability, recycled content, reuse, labelling and waste reduction are not amended by this opening. The official text is Regulation (EU) 2025/40 on EUR-Lex.
Confirm whether any plastic packaging you place on the EU market uses, or could use, bio-based feedstock. Put January 13, 2027 on the regulatory calendar as the close of the Article 8 consultation. Brief packaging development, procurement and food-contact compliance, and file the evidence where it would change the case you want the review to hear. Obsidian tracks the PPWR Article 8 review so the next Commission step is visible when it is published.
