The EC launches a stakeholder consultation to assess policy options that should adapt legislation to current industry's developments
The Machinery Directive is the core European legislation regulating products of the mechanical engineering industries. The Machinery Directive sets provisions on functional and safety rules that concerns CEMA products going from harvester machines to pesticide application equipment. Agricultural tractors, trailers and towed machinery are excluded of its scope, with the exception of the machines mounted on these vehicles.
Today, the Machinery Directive aims at:
- ensuring a high level of safety and protection for machinery users and other exposed persons and
- securing the free movement of machinery in the internal market.
After an evaluation carried out in 2018, the overall conclusion was that the Directive is generally relevant, effective, efficient, coherent and has EU added value.
However, a need for greater legal clarity of some of its provisions and better coherence with other legislation was identified. It further detected some administrative requirements that affect the efficiency of the Directive and could be simplified. In addition, the evaluation indicated that shortcomings in monitoring and enforcement of the Directive have affected its effectiveness. The evaluation showed that the Directive, supported by the New Approach principles, is relatively flexible to allow technological developments in a digital era.
Yet, new innovations in digitisation, such as Internet of Things IOT, Artificial Intelligence AI and the new generation of autonomous robots may test the Directive's effectiveness and fitness for purpose going forward. The Commission is following up on the findings of the evaluation and will analyse the impacts of possible areas for improvement and implications through an impact assessment.
Next steps
CEMA will collect insights from its members and will answer to the available questionnaire which is part of the impact assessment.
The feedback period runs from 7 June 2019 to 30 August 2019.
For further information on this topic, please get in touch with CEMA's Technical Director, Ivo Hostens.