Use this page to assemble the records that should sit behind an EUDR due diligence statement before a relevant product is placed on the EU market or exported.
It focuses on Article 9 information and evidence, geolocation, supplier records, risk assessment and mitigation support, information-system references, and retention.
Structured answer sets in this page tree.
Cited legal and guidance references.
Under the EU Deforestation Regulation, the due diligence statement is not the evidence itself. It is the filing that follows a due diligence process showing that the relevant product is deforestation-free, produced in accordance with relevant legislation in the country of production, and covered by the required statement or declaration. The evidence file should let a company reviewer or competent authority connect the product, commodity, plots or establishments, supplier chain, risk conclusion, mitigation work, and DDS reference records without relying on unsupported narrative.
Start the file with the product and actor facts: the relevant commodity or Annex I product, the operator or trader role, the placing-on-market or export event, and whether the product is supported by a due diligence statement or, where the simplified regime applies, a simplified declaration identifier.
Then connect those facts to Article 9 information collection. The file should preserve the information and evidence used to show the product is deforestation-free and legally produced, including plot or establishment location evidence, supply-chain information, and the records provided to competent authorities on request.
Use this EUDR evidence guide to check whether Article 9 information, geolocation records, supplier evidence, risk conclusions, DDS references, and retention controls are connected before a statement is filed.
Treat Article 9 as the intake checklist for the DDS evidence pack. The operator should be able to show what information was collected, where it came from, who checked it, and how it was preserved before the risk assessment was completed.
The strongest record links each product lot or shipment to the supplier evidence, geolocation evidence, and legality evidence used for that specific due diligence conclusion. A broad supplier policy or annual sustainability report is not a substitute for product-linked evidence.
The due diligence statement should not be filed while risk remains unresolved. The evidence file should show the risk assessment conclusion and the facts behind it: whether the assessment found no or only negligible risk of non-compliance, or whether mitigation was required before the product moved.
When risk is not negligible, keep the mitigation evidence with the same product record. The reviewer should see the original concern, the mitigation action, the revised conclusion, and the approval to proceed. If the product is produced in a low-risk country or part of a country, the file should still document the supply-chain complexity and circumvention or mixing checks that support simplified due diligence.
Geolocation data should be managed as controlled compliance evidence, not as a free-text supplier attachment. The record needs enough structure to show which plots or establishments supplied the relevant product and which DDS or declaration record used that data.
Supplier evidence should also preserve the supply-chain handoff. Downstream operators and traders need the required supply-chain information, including supplier details and, when the supplier is an operator, the due diligence statement reference number or declaration identifier.
A DDS evidence file should close with the filing identifiers and retention record. For operators, keep the due diligence statement record for five years and communicate DDS reference numbers to downstream operators and traders. Where the simplified declaration regime applies, keep the declaration identifier instead of treating the simplified filing as an ordinary supplier certificate.
For downstream operators and traders, preserve the Article 5 supply-chain information for at least five years and make it available to competent authorities on request. If new information indicates possible non-compliance, the evidence file should show who was informed, what verification happened, and whether the product was stopped before placement, making available, or export.
"Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2024/3084 on the EUDR information system."
"They keep the Article 5 information for at least five years."
"Operators and traders must be able to prove that the products do not originate from recently deforested land."
"Relevant commodities and relevant products must not be placed or made available on the market or exported unless they are deforestation-free."