Brazil's federal government has created a "socioenvironmental passport" meant to keep agribusiness exports flowing into the European Union as the bloc prepares rules that could block cargoes tied to illegal deforestation. The instrument, officially named Rasoe (Socioenvironmental Analysis Report for Export Operations), was approved by Camex, the government's foreign trade council, as Resolution CEC No. 17 on September 8, and published last week.
The pressure comes from the EU Deforestation Regulation, known as EUDR. According to Folha de S.Paulo, the law takes effect on December 30 of this year for large and medium companies and on June 30, 2027 for micro and small ones. European importers will have to prove, through traceability and geographic coordinates, that each product complied with the law of its country of origin and did not come from land deforested after December 31, 2020. The formal duty falls on European companies, but Brazilian producers and exporters will have to hand over the information to avoid cargoes being turned away at ports. Soy, beef, coffee, cocoa, timber, rubber, palm oil and hundreds of derivatives fall within the rule's reach.
What the document contains
The report will be issued through the Agro Brasil + Sustentável platform, run by the Ministry of Agriculture, which automatically cross-checks federal databases including the land reform agency Incra, the tax authority Receita Federal, the environmental agency Ibama, the indigenous affairs agency Funai, the space research institute Inpe and the Labor Ministry. It identifies the property, its total area, the space used for production and its geographic location, and comes with a file containing the polygon of the productive area plus a code to verify authenticity. At the end, the government states whether it found federal violations that could block the sale and whether the area was hit by embargoes or deforestation after December 2020. Trade outlet O Presente Rural reports the document was drafted by the foreign ministry and the agriculture ministry with 12 other ministries.
In practice, a producer no longer has to chase certificates across several agencies. The Rasoe, though, is not a full certification of a property's compliance. It reports what appears in the federal databases consulted and signals conformity with Brazilian law, without shifting responsibility for the product to the state. While the document was being prepared, Folha reports, the Environment Ministry itself asked the government to drop the verb "to certify" from the text.
What is at stake
The EU buys about half of Brazil's exported coffee, 15% of its soy and 20% of its timber, according to figures from the foreign and agriculture ministries cited by Folha. Brazilian sales to the bloc reached US$ 49 billion (about 250 billion reais) in 2025, and the new regulation could reach 36% of everything Brazil ships to the region.
Brazilian officials have been negotiating with the European Commission since 2023 to cut costs, clarify criteria and present the country's own environmental monitoring systems. The government's strategy is to adapt exporters without accepting the European demand as legitimate.
"The recognition of the Rasoe is an instrument of transparency and trade facilitation, and not a recognition of the legality or legitimacy of the EUDR as a unilateral measure," a technical note from the Finance Ministry says.
For producers, the passport replaces a scramble for paperwork across agencies with a single official report, though the final responsibility for the cargo stays with the exporter and the importer. For European consumers, the practical effect is more verifiable information about the origin of the soy, beef and coffee that reach the bloc's shelves.