Have you ever thought about what goes into a pot of paint? You can find paint everywhere: on your walls, your doors, your car and your appliances. It is an essential, omnipresent product. And yet the paint production and marketing process reveals a lot about the EU’s Single Market.
AkzoNobel is Europe’s largest paints and coatings company, and most of the products that we sell in Europe are produced here. Thanks to the Single Market, we can operate cross-border supply chains, allowing us to produce and sell the broadest range of products.
However, we also face barriers due to the diverging standards and labels for (green) products, like paints – and a patchwork of environmental standards, recycling systems and reporting requirements between countries. Local interpretation of EU legislation is not always aligned (e.g. enforcement) and national notifying bodies may operate different processes that cannot be explained.
Addressing the indoor air quality example
Let’s take an example. While there is a broad commitment to make buildings more sustainable, there is no common European approach in the area of indoor air quality in relation to (overtime) volatile organic compound (VOC) emissions from paints. As a result, multiple countries have gone ahead by setting their own standards, leading to a patchwork of national rules.
For paints this means different criteria per country, even between neighbouring countries such as Germany, Belgium and France, to determine what products are best in class / worst in class (in terms of emission levels). It means different labels with information to consumers about emissions, or no emission performance communication at all. And it means different administrative processes to get a product tested, approved and/or scored per market.
This situation exists already for several years in the European market and instead of converging there are new national policies on the horizon that, for example, set national rules for environmental performance and consumer information of products, adding to fragmentation.
In a true Single Market, there would be a common approach – preferably promoting sustainable products as much as possible. This would create clarity for businesses and consumers (e.g. on performance), and less complexity and costs for producers. We would prefer to invest our energy in making and selling the best and sustainable solutions at the best price, instead of managing barriers.
Where we should be heading
When painting, applying a primer first helps the finishing paint to adhere better on the surface of a material. When renovating the EU Single Market, working with a common primer can address barriers and support the functioning of our internal market.
AkzoNobel has embarked on a programme of more sustainable practices to match the ambition of the EU’s Green Deal. In the built environment, infrastructure and industry there are many opportunities to improve energy efficiency or otherwise reduce carbon emissions. But this transition raises the stakes. We need scalable and innovative solutions that can be rolled out across the EU.
That means making use of the entire toolbox. Harmonising regulation makes sense for environmental policies, so they do not become fragmented. Other instruments such as common standards (e.g. to determine the sustainability performance of a product) and mutual recognition or convergence of approaches (e.g. for testing and reporting) can also make a difference. Enforcement is another important factor.
By prioritising European solutions, we can simplify the customer journey and create better options for consumers and businesses towards more sustainable products. Also, it will help reduce production complexity and inefficiencies, easing the burden on companies moving towards more sustainable practices and along the way strengthen resilience in European supply chains. This is about ensuring that the EU’s Single Market really works, even for a pot of paint.
There is no common European approach in the area of indoor air quality in relation to (overtime) volatile organic compound (VOC) emissions from paints. As a result, multiple countries have gone ahead by setting their own standards, leading to a patchwork of national rules.
When painting, applying a primer first helps the finishing paint to adhere better on the surface of a material. When renovating the EU Single Market, working with a common primer can address barriers and support the functioning of our internal market.
