Automated Risk Assessment - Gaining Insight into Risk

The Risk assessment is the most important feature in the system. It helps you – whether you’re a brand owner or a supplier - to identify and understand potential risks related to the products you plan to move into, out of, or within the European Union.

A risk assessment is always performed at the level of a Unique Material Source (UMS).
 

Why is this important?

To comply with the European Deforestation Regulation (EUDR), companies must demonstrate that their products are not linked to illegal activities and deforestation. The risk assessment is the foundation of this demonstration. It provides data-backed insights into the risks within your supply chain and helps determine whether further investigation or mitigation is needed before proceeding with trade.

Risk Categories in the System

The system uses a comprehensive set of risk indicators, grouped into five main categories:

1. Traditional and Human Rights
2. Supply Chain
3. Illegally Harvested Wood
4. Deforestation
5. Species

These categories are aligned with Article 10 of the regulation and are also in line with the acknowledged timber certifying standards. Each category is supported by multiple data sources—up to 32 indicators in total—used to calculate the automated risk level of each Unique Material Source. 

Types of Automated Risk Assessment

The system offers two automated risk assessment options, which the brand owner can choose from: 

1. Full Risk Assessment (comprehensive)

• Evaluates all 32 indicators across the five categories in one step. 

• Provides a detailed and broad risk profile of the Unique Material Source. 

• Always included supply chain document face value checks. 

• Used when full traceability and risk coverage are requested by the Brand Owner company. 

• It can be time consuming because of the layers of details.  

2. Simplified Risk Assessment (two-step)

• The system evaluates a predefined subset of key indicators, which represent the minimum EUDR requirements.  
  These typically include: 
  • Species 
  • Deforestation 
  • Supply Chain 
  • Indigenous Peoples 
  • Sanctioned companies 

• If all simplified indicators return a low-risk score, the UMS is cleared without requiring document checks (“face value” review) and can be used directly for Purchase Orders. 

• If any simplified indicator shows a risk, then: 
  • The advice is to perform a full-faced value check of all supply chain documents. 
  • A Risk Mitigation Report is generated covering all relevant indicators, not just the simplified ones. 

Viewing Risk Assessment Results in the System

You can view the results of the automated risk assessment in any UMS that has been submitted for assessment at least once. This is visible through the UMS status:

• UMS awaiting document review
• UMS awaiting risk assessment
• Risk Assessment Complete

When a UMS is in one of these statuses, two additional tabs will appear when you open the UMS: 

1. Risk Assessment Result
   • Shows an aggregated risk score per category (the five categories listed above).
   • Helps you quickly understand which areas carry risk.
2. Risk Assessment Details
   • Provides a full list of all indicators, with individual automated risk scores.
   • If the simplified risk assessment was used, you'll see an additional column:
     "Used in risk assessment?" — where selected simplified indicators are marked.

Overview of EUDR Indicators per Commodity Type

Commodity	Main Risk Category		Simplified risk assessment
TIMBER  RUBBER	Species	Species WWF has consolidated various species risk sub- indicators for timber. This includes CITES and IUCN Redlist Status, which are crucial to the assessment, as well as legality based on trade volume and tropical hardwood. For more information see: https://www.woodrisk.org/species-risk  Species Origin Verification  WWF also verifies the country of origin for timber species to detect any anomalies and to ensure a comprehensive and reliable assessment.	Yes
TIMBER RUBBER	Deforestation	EU Country Classification  Country classification, as required by Article 10 (a), and described in Article 29. EU classified every country based on the criteria as described in Article 29 (3):   rate of deforestation and forest degradation. rate of expansion of agriculture land for relevant commodities. production trends of relevant commodities and of relevant products. They will be classified as described in Article 29 (1): High risk Low risk Standard risk Please find the classification of the countries:  https://green-forum.ec.europa.eu/nature-and-biodiversity/deforestation-regulation-implementation/eudr-cooperation-and-partnerships/country-classification-list_en	Yes
TIMBER   RUBBER	Deforestation	Satellite Imagery  High resolution, near real-time satellite imagery is used by Earthblox to detect deforestation. They also incorporate Dynamic World, which allocates land use categories to the imagery (such as 'forest' or 'crops').	Yes
TIMBER   RUBBER	Traditional and Human Rights	Satellite monitoring - Indigenous peoples    To identify indigenous Peoples, Landmark data layers are used, including indicative areas and the lands and territories of local communities. The checks are completed on plot coordinates.	No
TIMBER  RUBBER	Traditional and Human Rights	This risk indicator is built by multiple sub indicators like armed conflict, labor rights and customary rights, all which contribute to the overall FSC country score.	No
TIMBER   RUBBER	Illegal Harvesting	The Corruption Perception Index ranks countries by their perceived levels of public sector corruption, where a score of 0 is highly corrupt and 100 is very clean.	Yes
TIMBER	Illegal Harvesting	The FSC risk score is a measure of the number of sub indicators for specific laws that are at risk of being violated in a country. The more laws that are at risk of violation, the lower the score. Sub indicators that contribute to a score include harvesting permits, land tenure and management rights, timber regulations, protected sites and species and custom regulations.    If your FSC country score is below 50 (high risk), then you will be able to see which sub indicators contributed to the risk score in your report.	Yes
RUBBER	Illegal Harvesting	The Rubber country score (much like FSC) is calculated based on country specific risk assessments, and the likelihood of illegality. Higher scores indicate a higher risk of illegality and are aligned with the Global Platform for Sustainable Rubber (GPSNR), Verite, FSC and UN sources.	Yes
TIMBER  RUBBER	Supply Chain	Material type complexity    Material-complexity risk is important under the European Deforestation Regulation because it affects how easily a product can be traced back to regulated commodities. Solid products with a single material are simpler to verify, while composites or mixed materials increase uncertainty by combining inputs from different supply chains. Virgin materials fall fully within scope and require full traceability, whereas recycled content carries lower risk because it is out of scope, though its share must still be identified to determine what parts need due diligence.  Processing steps that mix or transform materials can further obscure origin, increasing the complexity of compliance.	Yes
TIMBER RUBBER	Supply Chain	Supply Chain Completeness    Supply chain completeness under EUDR is determined by verifying that every step from the plot of land to the final operator is documented and consistent. Face-value checks confirm that legal documents appear to be genuine, relevant, and coherent, ensuring each supply-chain link can be trusted.	Yes
TIMBER  RUBBER	Supply Chain	Supply-chain complexity    Supply-chain complexity reflects how difficult it is to trace a product back to its origin. It is assessed by the number of tiers (levels of suppliers), nodes (individual entities within those tiers), and countries involved. Low-risk supply chains are short and concentrated, with few tiers, few actors, and typically a single country, making traceability straightforward. Standard-risk supply chains involve more layers and a larger number of entities, increasing the effort required to confirm compliance. High-risk supply chains are highly fragmented, spanning many tiers, numerous actors, and multiple countries, making it significantly harder to verify origin and assess regulatory conformity.	Yes
TIMBER  RUBBER	Supply Chain	Country level sanctions    We check the UN, EU and US sanction list for country wide restrictive measures. If any of the countries in the supply chain are found to be on those sanction lists, then the risk is high.	Yes
TIMBER  RUBBER	Supply Chain	Sanctioned entities    We check the UN, EU and US sanction list for individuals and entities. If any supply chain actor is found to be on those sanction lists, then the risk is high.	Yes