Who is the economic operator for your product?

The economic operator is whoever first makes your product available on the European Union market. If your company is in New Zealand and has no office in the Union, the economic operator is your EU importer.

That answer decides who the law can penalise. It does not mean you have nothing to do. Your importer cannot sell your product until it holds a set of documents, and only you can produce them. It also cannot supply data that you never gave it.

The duty follows the operator that places the product on the market

The first binding passport duty in EU law is the battery passport. It does not come from the ecodesign regulation. It comes from the EU battery regulation, which is in force.

Article 77(4) of that regulation says:

The economic operator placing the battery on the market shall ensure that the information in the battery passport is accurate, complete and up to date. It may give written authorisation to any other operator to act on its behalf.

A recital says the same thing in plainer words:

The responsibility of compliance with the provisions for the battery passport should lie with the economic operator that places the battery on the market.

Article 77(1) names three kinds of battery:

• each light means of transport (LMT) battery, such as an e-bike battery
• each industrial battery with a capacity greater than 2 kilowatt hours
• each electric vehicle battery

Warning: a light means of transport battery carries no size threshold. An e-bike battery needs a passport whatever its capacity.

The batteries page sets out the scope in full. Other batteries get a QR code to other information under Article 13(6), but they do not get a passport.

For a New Zealand exporter, that operator is the EU importer

Two definitions in Article 3(1) settle the point.

An importer is "any natural or legal person established within the Union who places on the market a battery from a third country". To place on the market is "the first making available of a battery on the Union market".

New Zealand is outside the Union. So if you have no EU establishment, you cannot be the importer, and you do not place the battery on the market.

Take an e-bike battery made in Christchurch and sold to a buyer in Hamburg. The German buyer brings it in and sells it first. The German buyer is the importer, and the German buyer carries the passport duty.

Your importer cannot verify what you never sent

Article 41(2) of the battery regulation gives the importer a fixed list to check before it places a battery on the market. The list holds the EU declaration of conformity, the technical documentation, the conformity assessment, the CE marking and the labelling. Only you can produce those items, so the list is a description of your work.

If one item is missing, the importer must not place the battery on the market. Your stock then stays in a warehouse in Germany. What a non-EU exporter must supply quotes the article and names who produces each item.

Written authorisation does not move the responsibility

Article 77(4) lets the responsible operator authorise another operator in writing to act on its behalf. Your EU importer can authorise you to enter the passport data, because you hold it.

That authorisation is not a transfer of responsibility. The operator that placed the battery on the market stays responsible for accuracy, completeness and currency.

One route does transfer the duty. Article 77(7) moves it when a battery is re-used, repurposed, remanufactured, or becomes waste. The new operator then issues a new passport. The lifecycle events page covers that case.

Agree the duties in writing before the first shipment. The page agreeing data duties explains what to cover.

A consortium paper states a wider duty

A white paper of 31 March 2026 from the PARSEC, CIRPASS-2 and BORDERLINK projects states three points:

• The duty to issue and register a passport falls on the operator that places the product on the EU market.
• A non-EU manufacturer stays a duty-holder regardless of establishment.
• Appointing an authorised representative does not move responsibility away from the manufacturer.

That document is a paper from EU-funded projects. It is not legislation, and it binds nobody.

The first point matches the battery regulation. The second point and the third point go further than the text quoted above. Treat them as a position your EU customer may take in a contract.

The ecodesign regulation applies the same test

The Ecodesign for Sustainable Products Regulation (ESPR) is the framework law for passports. It came into force in July 2024.

Its Article 13(4) says:

The economic operator placing the product on the market or putting it into service shall upload, in the registry, the data referred to in paragraphs 1 and 2.

The test is the same, and the operator is the same. The EU registry page explains what that upload contains.

The registry does not change where an operator must be established. Recital 7 of Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2026/1778 gives the reason. It states that the use of the registry "should not circumvent or undermine" other Union law on the place of establishment.

No ESPR upload duty reaches anybody yet. The duty starts only when the European Commission adopts a rule for a product group, called a delegated act. As at August 2026 the Commission has adopted no such rule. Read how to read the timeline before you plan a date.

Annex III of ESPR lists what a passport must carry once a delegated act covers your product. It requires information on the importer. It also requires the name and the contact details of the responsible economic operator. That operator must be established in the Union. The passport must carry its unique operator identifier as well.

Some products need an EU operator before anybody can sell them

One more rule, which is not about passports, comes before all of this.

Regulation (EU) 2019/1020 names eighteen pieces of EU product law. An economic operator established in the Union must take responsibility for a product covered by any of them. That must occur before the product goes on the market. Article 4 sets that condition.

If no such operator exists for your product, no passport work helps you. Find the operator first. Market surveillance and customs describes who checks.

Name the operator, and agree the documents in writing

A buyer that calls itself a distributor is the importer for anything it brings in from New Zealand. See what a distributor or a retailer must do.

• Ask your EU buyer if it imports your product directly.
• Record the name of the operator that places your product on the market.
• Agree in writing who supplies, approves and updates each document.
• Keep the conformity documents and the product markings current and ready to send.
• Send them before the first sale. Do not wait for the importer to ask.