Rethinking the EU’s Deforestation Regulation: A Fairer Approach to Palm Oil in the Global South

This paper explores the debate on the European Union’s Deforestation Regulation on the Palm Oil Industry. While most of the existing literature focuses on the implications of the regulation on the Global South, I explore whether the EU is obligated to revise the regulation on moral terms. In addressing this question, I argue that the European Union has a moral obligation to revise the deforestation regulation or find an alternative way of promoting sustainable agri-food production. The justification is in line with the theory of ‘global distributive justice’, where the benefits and burdens of the policy should be fairly distributed, taking into account the nation’s capabilities and historical contributions to the problem.