Industrial Policy & Trade Monitor· 2666 actions· ✨ 90 recent

Regulation (EU) 2025/40, published in the Official Journal on 22 January 2025 and entering into force on 11 February 2025, replaces the 1994 Packaging and Packaging Waste Directive 94/62/EC with a directly-applicable Regulation. It mandates binding recycled-content targets for plastic packaging (by polymer and format, reaching 30–65% by 2030 with higher targets by 2040), minimum reusable-packaging shares for beverages and transport, recyclability standards for all packaging placed on the EU market from 2030, deposit-return-scheme obligations for beverage containers from 2029, and bans on specified single-use plastic packaging formats. General application begins 12 August 2026, with staggered compliance windows extending to 2030 and beyond, affecting all non-EU exporters shipping consumer goods, beverages, or e-commerce fulfilment into the EU single market.

On 16 December 2024 the Council of the European Union adopted Council Regulation (EU) 2024/3192 amending Regulation (EU) 833/2014, the 15th package of restrictive measures against Russia. The package adds 84 asset-freeze listings (54 individuals and 30 entities) under Regulation 269/2014 — for the first time including fully-fledged designations of seven Chinese individuals and entities supplying drone components, machine tools, and dual-use goods to the Russian military-industrial complex. It expands the EU shadow-fleet vessel- ban list by 52 tankers (total 79), activates the standalone EU hybrid- threats sanctions regime with its first 16-individual / 3-entity designations, extends the wind-down derogation for divestment from Russian subsidiaries to 31 December 2025, and reinforces anti- circumvention contractual clauses on EU exporters of dual-use goods.

Tunisia's Finance Law for 2025 (Loi n° 2024-48, signed 9 December 2024, published in JORT n° 149 on 10 December 2024) institutes under Article 38 a one-year Contribution Conjoncturelle — a cyclical windfall-style fiscal levy — applicable to all enterprises subject to the standard 15% corporate income tax rate whose 2023 turnover exceeded 20 million dinars (excluding VAT). The contribution is set at 2% of the taxable profits for fiscal year 2025, with a minimum floor of 1,000 dinars, and is explicitly non-deductible from the corporate income tax base. The measure is a budget-financing instrument adopted in the context of the stalled IMF Extended Fund Facility programme (suspended since 2023) and constitutes the IPTM register's second Tunisia-issuer action, extending the LF-year-on-year Tunisian fiscal-policy arc established by LF2024 Art. 33.

In two consecutive sectoral notifications, Pakistan's Special Technology Zones Authority (STZA) — a federal body under the Cabinet Division — formally declared two additional Special Technology Zones. The Khanpur Industrial Project (Mumrial, Khanpur, District Haripur, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa; ~197 acres / 199,174 sq ft of existing and proposed infrastructure) was notified on 12 September 2024. The LEOS Technology Zone (Lehtrar Road, Nilore, Islamabad; 19.23 acres / 225,562 sq ft) was notified on 8 November 2024. Both zones operate under the Special Technology Zones Authority Act, 2021 incentive regime, which provides Zone Enterprises and Zone Developers a 10-year exemption from income tax, customs duty on capital-goods imports, and sales tax (under the Customs Act 1969, Income Tax Ordinance 2001 and Sales Tax Act 1990), together with eligibility for Special Forex Accounts under State Bank of Pakistan regulations (no requirement to convert USD inflows to PKR). The umbrella incentive window for the STZA regime runs until 30 June 2035, with each zone enterprise's 10-year clock starting from the date the zone developer certifies commercial operation.

The U.S. Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) published in the Federal Register (89 FR 84472–84474, FR Doc 2024-24524) three general licenses issued under the Western Balkans Stabilization Regulations (31 CFR Part 588): GL 3A, GL 4, and GL 5. All three were originally issued on 18 June 2024 concurrent with OFAC's expansion of Republika Srpska / Dodik-network designations; the 23 October 2024 Federal Register notice formalises them per the Administrative Procedure Act notice requirements. GL 3A (which superseded GL 3 of 16 November 2023) authorises transactions involving certain WBSR-blocked entities that are ordinarily incident and necessary to the exportation or re-exportation of agricultural commodities, medicine, medical devices, replacement parts and components, software updates, or activities involving medical prevention, diagnosis, treatment, or clinical trials. GL 4 authorises wind-down transactions with entities blocked on 18 June 2024 through a defined cutoff. GL 5 authorises transactions ordinarily incident and necessary to the manufacture, distribution, operation, installation, or maintenance/repair of drinking-water pumps manufactured or distributed by the WBSR-blocked Bosnian Serb entity Kaldera Company EL PGP d.o.o. (and 50%-or-more-owned subsidiaries), preserving municipal water supply continuity.

On 26 July 2024 President Erdoğan unveiled the HIT-30 (High-Technology Investment Programme), Türkiye's largest single industrial-finance instrument since the 2018 Investment Office reform, allocating USD 30 billion in state support over 2024-2030 to attract investment across 37 priority programmes spanning electric vehicles, batteries, semiconductors, solar/wind energy, green hydrogen, hyperscale data centres, biotechnological medicine, industrial robotics, and R&D. The Ministry of Industry and Technology is the operating agency, with the Industrialization Executive Committee chaired by the President providing high-level oversight; an Industrialisation Executive Committee under the President directs sectoral allocations. Headline tools include USD 4.5bn earmarked for an 80 GWh battery-manufacturing capacity (with USD 6,000/MWh grants through 2030), USD 2.5bn for 15 GW of domestic solar-cell capacity, USD 1.7bn for wind-component manufacturing, USD 1bn for top-1000 corporate R&D centre support (covering 50% of personnel costs for 5 years), corporate tax reductions, social-security-contribution coverage, energy-cost subsidies covering 50% of bills for energy-intensive projects, customs/VAT exemptions, and free or discounted land allocation in organised industrial zones. Programme targets at least USD 20bn in private-sector co-investment.

Cabinet Secretary for Mining issued comprehensive royalty-collection regulations under section 183 of the Mining Act 2016, published as Legal Notice No. 106 of 2024 in Kenya Gazette Vol. CXXVI No. 98 of 5 July 2024 (commenced 3 July 2024). The regulations standardise royalty rates by mineral and royalty-base methodology (gross sales value), set a 120-day payment window with CBK-rate compounding penalties for late payment, and codify the 70/30 national-county allocation split with the county portion further divided 60% county / 20% community development / 20% landowner royalties. Companion to the October 2023 lifting of the four-year mining-licence moratorium and reclassification of REE, niobium, lithium, graphite and coltan as "strategic minerals" requiring case-by-case licensing through the National Mining Corporation. Subsequently declared unconstitutional by the High Court in September 2025 for failure to meet public-participation requirements (see amendments).

Italy's Decreto-Legge 25 giugno 2024 n. 84, converted with amendments into Legge 8 agosto 2024 n. 115 (Gazzetta Ufficiale n. 189 of 13 August 2024, in force 14 August 2024), is Italy's national implementing instrument for Regulation (EU) 2024/1252 (the EU Critical Raw Materials Act). It establishes a MIMIT-led national governance framework for strategic CRM projects spanning extraction, transformation, and recycling; creates a mandatory National Register of strategic companies and value chains with annual reporting on strategic-material import/export flows; divides permitting competence between MASE (extraction/recycling, max 18/10 months) and MIMIT (transformation, max 10 months); and designates INVITALIA and CDP as financing windows for Italian strategic-CRM projects seeking EU Strategic Project status under CRMA Article 6.

Regulation (EU) 2024/1735 - the Net Zero Industry Act (NZIA) - was published in the Official Journal on 22 June 2024 and entered into force on 12 July 2024 (twenty days after OJ publication). It sets a binding target that at least 40% of the EU's annual deployment needs for net-zero technologies be manufactured within the EU by 2030. It establishes a streamlined permitting regime for Net-Zero Strategic Projects (NZSP) capped at 18 months for construction permits (9 months for smaller projects), creates Net-Zero Regulatory Sandboxes, and requires public procurers and auction designers to include resilience and sustainability criteria that effectively favour non-China-sourced equipment. The Act is the manufacturing-capacity complement to the Critical Raw Materials Act (CRMA, Reg 2024/1252, filed separately) and was explicitly designed to close the EU's competitive gap with US IRA manufacturing incentives.

On 4 June 2024 the Philippine Department of Energy issued Department Circular DC2024-06-0018, the Revised Omnibus Guidelines Governing the Award and Administration of Renewable Energy Contracts and the Registration of Renewable Energy Developers. The circular operationalises the November 2022 reinterpretation (DC2022-11-0034) under which solar, wind, biomass and ocean/tidal RE resources are excluded from the constitutional 60-40 nationality cap on natural-resource exploitation, allowing 100% foreign-owned applicants to take RE Service Contracts in those four resource classes. Geothermal RE contracts remain subject to the 60-40 Filipino-ownership requirement. The Guidelines also restructure pre-award, award and post-award procedures across the ~1,400 RE service contracts (≈154 GW) in the DOE pipeline and allow developers to begin permitting and feasibility work before the 25-year contract term formally begins.

On 17 May 2024 the US Forced Labor Enforcement Task Force (FLETF), chaired by DHS, published the largest single expansion of the UFLPA Entity List to date, adding 26 PRC-based companies (89 FR 43365). The majority are cotton traders and warehouse operators located outside the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR) but identified as downstream conduits laundering XUAR-origin cotton into global supply chains. Under the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act's rebuttable-presumption (§2(d)(2)(B)(v)), goods wholly or in part produced by any listed entity are presumed to violate 19 U.S.C. §1307 and are barred from US entry unless the importer demonstrates by clear and convincing evidence that no forced labour was involved. US apparel brands with exposure to the listed traders (Levi's, Gap, PVH/Calvin Klein sourcing chains) were required to trace and unwind that exposure within 60 days.

Latvia's Saeima adopted on 27 March 2024 amendments to the National Security Law (Nacionālās drošības likums), entering into force on 24 April 2024, that widen the perimeter of foreign-investment and ownership transactions subject to Cabinet of Ministers pre-clearance over "companies of significance to national security." The amendments expand the universe of regulated subjects beyond registered companies to include foundations and associations, tighten the rules on beneficial-ownership disclosure, and bring additional sensitive activities — energy security including LNG-terminal acquisitions, electronic communications, cybersecurity, and critical-raw-materials processing — under the regime, while clarifying Cabinet authority to impose conditions or unwind transactions retroactively. The law functions as Latvia's horizontal FDI-screening instrument under the EU-wide cooperation framework of Regulation 2019/452.

Portugal's Council of Ministers adopted Resolution n.º 49/2024 on 26 March 2024, establishing the Sistema de Incentivos ao Investimento em Setores Estratégicos (Strategic Sectors Investment Incentive System) — a dedicated state-aid window anchored to the EU Temporary Crisis and Transition Framework (TCTF, Commission Communication C(2023)1711) and routed through Portugal's Regime Contratual de Investimento (RCI, Decree-Law 191/2014). The scheme covers green-transition equipment manufacturing (batteries, solar panels, wind turbines, heat pumps, electrolysers, CCUS) and upstream critical raw materials (lithium, cobalt, nickel, manganese, copper, rare earths, graphite, anode/cathode precursor chemistries), offering cumulative grant equivalents up to 35% of eligible investment for large enterprises and 45–55% for SMEs, Cohesion-Region operations, or strategic-priority categories. A hard 31 December 2025 approval-decision sunset tied to TCTF expiry drove a Q3–Q4 2025 project-decision rush. The scheme served as the primary domestic state-aid instrument underpinning Portugal's four EU CRMA-designated strategic projects (Savannah Barroso lithium, Lusorecursos Aguas Frias lithium, Lifthium Estarreja LiCO3/LiOH refinery, Bondalti Estarreja lithium-derivatives integration).

The U.S. Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) published in the Federal Register (89 FR 16400, FR Doc 2024-04856) two general licenses issued under the Western Balkans Stabilization Regulations (31 CFR Part 588): GL 2 and GL 3. Both were originally issued on 16 November 2023 concurrent with OFAC's initial round of Republika Srpska / Dodik-network designations; the 7 March 2024 Federal Register notice formalises them per the Administrative Procedure Act notice requirements. GL 2 authorises wind-down transactions with newly blocked WBSR entities through 15 March 2024. GL 3 authorises exports and re-exports of agricultural commodities, medicine, medical devices, replacement parts, and services for medical prevention and treatment to WBSR-blocked persons; GL 3 was subsequently superseded by GL 3A on 18 June 2024.

Bulgaria's National Assembly adopted on 22 February 2024 amendments to the Investment Promotion Act establishing the country's first horizontal foreign direct investment screening mechanism, published in State Gazette No. 20 on 8 March 2024 and entering into force on 12 March 2024. The regime implements EU Regulation 2019/452 by creating an Interdepartmental Screening Council with a 45-day decision window over non-EU investments meeting a 10 % equity stake or €2 million threshold in critical-infrastructure, dual-use, advanced-technology, media, and financial-infrastructure sectors, with no threshold for investments by Russian or Belarusian persons or in oil and petroleum activities. Non-compliance and false declarations carry fines of 5 % of investment value, with a minimum BGN 50,000.

Slovakia's Národná rada adopted Act No. 31/2024 Z.z. on 13 February 2024, amending Act No. 57/2018 Z.z. on Regional Investment Aid by inserting two new sections — §28a (Mimoriadna investičná pomoc / Exceptional Investment Aid) and §28b (Exceptional Investment Aid in sectors strategic for the transition to a climate-neutral economy) — creating the national legal base for disbursing the EC-approved €1 billion Slovak TCTF net-zero state-aid envelope (EC decision 15 December 2023, SA case approved under the Temporary Crisis and Transition Framework). The scheme supports manufacturers of batteries, solar panels, wind turbines, heat pumps, electrolysers, CCUS equipment, key components thereof, and related critical raw materials, with aid ceilings of €350 million per project in general districts and €150 million in Bratislava region, at aid intensities of 15–60% depending on company size and geography. Act 31/2024 is the horizontal enabling statute underpinning all large-scale Slovak net-zero state-aid awards flowing from the TCTF/NZIA envelopes — including future battery gigafactory, electrolyser, and clean-tech plant grants in the 2024–2025 window.