Making Digital Product Passports Work for Small Businesses

Digital Product Passports (DPPs) have the potential to make product compliance simpler and more efficient for small businesses while supporting their ability to operate and grow across the EU Single Market. For SMEs selling across borders, product-information, labelling and documentation requirements can create additional administrative costs and complexity. Moving relevant product information from static physical documentation towards accessible digital resources could help simplify some of these processes and make information easier to update and use across markets.

At the same time, the design and implementation of DPP requirements will be particularly important for smaller businesses. While digitalisation can create opportunities to reduce compliance costs and facilitate access to new markets, SMEs may also face disproportionate challenges related to data collection, technical infrastructure, interoperability, implementation costs and the practical management of new requirements.

For SMEs, the central question is therefore not simply whether Digital Product Passports can deliver benefits, but how the framework should be designed and implemented so that those benefits outweigh the costs and complexity of implementation. This working breakfast will bring together policymakers, SMEs and industry representatives to examine the business case for DPPs, practical implementation experiences and policy approaches that can make digital product information work effectively for smaller businesses.

Particular attention will be given to the potential for DPPs to facilitate cross-border trade, reduce unnecessary administrative and paper-based processes, and support SMEs seeking to scale within the Single Market and internationally, while avoiding disproportionate new burdens for smaller companies.