EU postpones lead ban on hunting ammunition by seven years

On 25 June 2026, the REACH Committee of the EU Commission approved a new version of the lead ban on hunting ammunition. Instead of the eighteen months originally envisaged, a transition period of seven years will apply to lead shot in future, while bullet ammunition falls out of the scope of the regulation altogether.

What was decided on 25 June

The representatives of the EU member states agreed in the REACH Committee on a compromise text that massively waters down the EU Commission's original ban proposal. Lead shot for hobby hunting is only to be banned after a seven-year transition period, after the timeframe was gradually stretched in the past rounds of negotiations from three to five and then to seven years. Bullet ammunition containing lead, which is used for predators and cloven-hoofed game, was removed entirely from the regulatory proposal. The decision is not yet a final law. The Council and Parliament must approve the compromise within three months before it can enter into force as a binding amendment to the REACH Regulation (EC) No 1907/2006.

For the hobby hunting lobby, the decision is a success. The president of the French Fédération Nationale des Chasseurs, Willy Schraen, publicly hailed the outcome as confirmation that the «realities of rural areas» had prevailed against a Commission that had long ignored them.

Who pushed through the delay

The driving force behind the dilution was an alliance of hobby hunting associations and the ammunition industry. At the European level, the umbrella organisation FACE (Federation of Associations for Hunting and Conservation of the EU) coordinated the lobbying towards the REACH committee and, in November 2025, organised an event at the EU Parliament at which the ammunition manufacturers' association AFEMS warned of «considerable consequences» for the sector. In France, the FNC, the ammunition manufacturers' association SNAFAM and the CSNA joined forces to press the French government for an extension of the deadlines. According to consistent reports in the hunting press, several governments, whose names are not individually disclosed in the committee's meeting minutes, raised geopolitical and security-policy concerns: given the current armament situation, the ammunition industry, which runs civilian and military production in parallel, could not be expected to undertake such a rapid industrial conversion.

Even within France the front was not uniform. While the environment minister defended a five-year deadline, the then interior minister Bruno Retailleau demanded a delay of up to ten years and had the economic and security-policy consequences for the equipping of the security forces specifically clarified before the government took a position.

Who campaigned for a swift ban

On the opposing side stood the scientific community and European bird and nature conservation. The European Chemicals Agency (ECHA) had already proposed a comprehensive restriction in 2021, and its scientific committees RAC and SEAC confirmed in their 2023 opinions that the risks to the environment and human health justify a ban. BirdLife International, whose French partner organisation LPO has been fighting for a comprehensive lead ban for over twenty years, described the original Commission draft as a «historic step» and sharply criticises the current dilution. A petition backed by BirdLife for an EU-wide ban gathered over 61’000 signatures. When the EU Parliament voted in 2020 on the preceding ban on lead shot in wetlands, the right-wing populist Identity and Democracy group unsuccessfully attempted to overturn the plan by resolution; 499 members voted against it.

Why the process has dragged on for years

The delaying tactics follow a recurring pattern that has been observable since the first ECHA restriction proposal of 2018: each round of negotiations brings an extension of the transition periods, without the underlying scientific assessment changing. The dispute long ago ceased to be about whether lead is toxic, and now revolves solely around how many exemptions and how long transition periods politics will permit. The REACH committee procedure structurally favours this dynamic: because the Commission depends on a qualified majority of member states, a coordinated blocking minority is enough to keep stretching deadlines ever further in the renegotiation process, without formally bringing the project down.

The situation in Switzerland

Switzerland is not an EU member and is therefore not directly bound by the REACH decision, but it traditionally follows European chemicals law with a delay, within the framework of autonomous adoption. Nationally, exactly the same delaying pattern is evident as in Brussels. Lead shot has been banned in waterfowl hunting since 1998, but further areas remained unregulated for years. A motion by National Councillor Martina Munz (SP/SH) for a far-reaching ban on lead-containing ammunition failed in the National Council in 2023 by the narrowest of margins, with 99 votes to 94.

Only the revised hunting ordinance, which came into force on 1 February 2025, bans lead-containing bullet ammunition of calibre 6 mm and above for hobby hunting of cloven-hoofed animals. But here, too, a long transition period applies: until 31 December 2029 the old ammunition remains permitted, so that the cantons have time to adapt their own regulations. Lead shot outside of wetlands remains entirely unregulated. The result is a cantonal patchwork: Grisons has banned lead-containing bullet ammunition in the high hunt since as early as 2021, Appenzell Outer Rhodes and St. Gallen have also taken the lead, while numerous other cantons wait for a national solution that is consistently postponed.

Health authorities continue to issue unchanged warnings: the Federal Food Safety and Veterinary Office (FSVO) recommends that children up to the age of seven, pregnant and breastfeeding women, and women wishing to have children abstain almost entirely from consuming game meat, because a lead content from the ammunition cannot be ruled out. More on the scientific basis, the lobbying efforts and the political blockades in Switzerland is provided in the dossier Lead ammunition and hobby hunting: facts, ban, lobby analysis.

Sources

• Chasse Passion, «Interdiction du plomb : le délai passe de 5 à 7 ans selon les derniers textes Européens», 26 June 2026
• So Chasse, «Cartouches de chasse : pourquoi les 7 années accordées par Bruxelles changent tout pour la filière ?», interview with Yvan Pham (SNAFAM), June 2026
• Chasse Passion, «Restriction du plomb en Europe : plus qu’à la chasse, c’est du côté de la défense que cela pêche», 26 June 2026
• Union Française des Amateurs d’Armes, «Interdiction du plomb : gagner du temps», December 2025
• LPO / BirdLife International, press releases on lead ammunition, 2020–2023
• SNAFAM, «Restriction de l’usage des munitions au plomb au sein de l’Europe», chronology, October 2025
• ECHA, opinions of the RAC and SEAC committees on the restriction of lead in ammunition, 6 March 2023
• Senate (France), parliamentary questions 22/07/00647 and 25/04/00431S
• Curia Vista, Motion 22.3641 «Ban on lead-containing ammunition», Swiss Parliament
• Nau.ch, «Swiss animal welfare organisation calls for ban on lead ammunition», December 2022
• Jagd & Natur, «Revised hunting act – what awaits hunters», December 2024
• Wild beim Wild, «Lead ammunition and hobby hunting: facts, ban, lobby analysis»