From 27 September, “Eco” is No Longer Free to Say – InfoCons Consumer Protection Informs You !
You are standing in front of the detergent shelf: two bottles in the same price bracket. The first one says, in green, “eco-responsible formula”. The second says “97% plant-based ingredients” with a code that leads to the full list. You have four seconds and a half-full basket. Almost all of us take the first bottle. It sounds better and it sounds complete. The difference between the two labels has nothing to do with chemistry. It comes down to the fact that one makes a claim that cannot be verified, while the other makes a claim that can be contradicted. From 27 September 2026, the first one becomes illegal.
What changes on 27 September 2026
Romania has transposed the European anti-greenwashing rules through Government Emergency Ordinance no. 18/2026, published in the Official Gazette no. 236 of 26 March 2026. The ordinance amends Law no. 363/2007 on combating unfair business-to-consumer commercial practices and transposes Directive (EU) 2024/825, known as the directive on empowering consumers for the green transition.
It applies in stages. The first deadline, 19 June 2026, covered online interfaces and the right of withdrawal from contracts. The next one, 27 September 2026, covers exactly what concerns us here: what a company is allowed to write on a product about its effect on the environment.
The part that matters to you as a buyer is technical, but worth understanding. The practices below join the list of those considered unfair in all circumstances. That means the authority no longer has to prove that the claim actually misled a consumer in a particular case. It is enough that the claim is there on the packaging.
There are six rules:
- The sustainability label that rests on nothing. The green leaf drawn by the company’s agency, with “responsible product” set in a circle, looks like a certification without being one. From September, a sustainability label is permitted only if it comes from a certification scheme or is established by a public authority.
- The generic environmental claim, with no demonstrated performance. “Eco”, “green”, “nature-friendly”, “environmentally conscious”, “gentle on the planet”. Words that delimit nothing. They remain permitted only where the product has excellent, recognized environmental performance that is relevant to the claim being made.
- The claim about the whole product, when it concerns a single part of it. The packaging is recycled, the product is not. The communication says, “sustainable product”. From September, the claim has to state clearly what it refers to.
- “Climate neutral”, achieved through offsetting. A product that emits as much as it did last year, but has bought offset credits, can no longer be presented as neutral, reduced or positive for the environment. It is the biggest change on the list and it affects entire categories — air travel, parcel delivery, packaging.
- The legal obligation presented as a merit. If the law already bans a substance, you cannot turn its absence into a distinguishing feature of your product. “X-free” written large, when no product in the category is allowed to contain X, is a claim that imitates a choice.
- The false claim about how long the product lasts. This is where a second set of rules connects, on durability and reparability, which deserves an article of its own.
There is also a seventh rule which concerns the future. Promises of the “net zero by 2035” kind remain permitted only if there is a detailed and realistic plan behind them, with measurable, time-bound targets, verified by an independent third party. A target announced in a press release is no longer enough.
Why the vague word works
A precise word can be contradicted. If a manufacturer writes “97% plant-based ingredients”, someone can take the list and check it. If it writes “eco-responsible formula”, there is nothing to check, because nothing has been claimed.
That is the mechanism, and it is not a drafting accident.
In the meeting where the packaging copy gets decided, someone always asks whether we can substantiate the claim. When the answer is no, there are two ways out. The first: change the product until you can substantiate the claim. The second: change the claim until it no longer needs substantiating. The second one is cheaper and it is finished before lunch.
The vague word is a decision taken by a person, in a meeting, with the budget on the table.
What a claim that can be verified looks like
Four features, all of them observable without specialist knowledge.
It is specific. It says what exactly, rather than how the product is in general. “Packaging made from 80% recycled plastic” says something. “Responsible packaging” does not.
It is measured. It contains a figure, a unit or an explicit comparison. When you see “30% less”, look immediately for “less than what”. If it does not say what it is compared to, the comparison does not exist.
It is bounded. It refers to an identifiable part: the packaging, the formula, the transport, the production process. Claims that cover everything usually cover nothing.
It can be verified by someone else. It points to a recognized certification, a standard, a public report. A QR code that leads to the manufacturer’s own marketing page is not verification, it is the advertisement continuing.
The six-question test
You can run it in front of the shelf, in under a minute:
- What exactly about the product is “eco”: the packaging, the contents, the transport, the factory?
- Is there a figure? If so, what is it being compared to?
- Who confirms the claim, apart from the company making it?
- Is the symbol on the pack a real certification, or a drawing made by the manufacturer?
- If it says, “climate neutral”, does the neutrality come from reduced emissions or from purchased credits?
- Is the announced benefit a choice made by the manufacturer, or a legal obligation that applies to the whole category?
If you cannot find an answer to three of them on the packaging or on the website, what you have in front of you is an image claim.
For companies: this is not a copywriting problem
I have run enough positioning projects to know what the moment looks like when the vague word appears. It appears late, once the product is already defined and all that is left is to “dress” it. At that stage the only instrument available is language, and language is asked to cover a distance the product does not travel.
An environmental claim that survives an inspection is not written at the end. It is obtained at the beginning, when a company decides what it does better than the alternative and how much it is willing to invest in it. That is where, at PLURIEL, the real decision is made: you either choose ground on which you can produce evidence, or ground on which you can only produce adjectives.
From 27 September, the second kind of ground has consequences. The National Authority for Consumer Protection can establish the practice, order it to stop and apply sanctions, without having to prove that a particular consumer was deceived.
The communication cost of withdrawing a message is, in any case, higher than the cost of never having written it.
What is left to do
The rules do not tell you which product to buy, but they do say that from 27 September the words on the packaging have to mean something. Take the bottle of detergent you already have at home and read its label against the six questions. Not in order to throw it away, but in order to see how much of what you bought was information and how much was tone. It is a three-minute exercise that changes the way you look at the shelf next time.
And if, after 27 September, you find a claim on the market that does not pass the test, it is no longer merely debatable. It can be reported to the authorities.
Signature : Alexandru Filip
About the Author
Alexandru Filip is a brand strategist and the founder of PLURIEL, a strategy, brand and digital studio based in Bucharest. He spent the first half of his career in major advertising agencies and the second leading communication, brand and digital strategy at European and global level inside complex international organizations. PLURIEL brings those worlds together: the strategic judgement to make the right decision, the creative fluency to make it distinctive, and the technical capability to turn it into reality.