Tijdschrift voor Agrarisch Recht - Volume 85, Issue 3, 2025

The author discusses current case law on the ‘forgotten will’ and the ‘draft will with legal effect’. Did the testator intend the will to regulate only the relationships that existed at the time it was drawn up, and not the newly created situation? If so, the will could be set aside with Art. 4:46 Civil Code and the law of intestate succession would determine the inheritance. If the inheritance law will has not changed, but the circumstances have, Schols argues, a new will with the same content may be desirable: the confirmation will.

A draft will may result in the court intervening in inheritance law on the basis of reasonableness and fairness (Art. 6:2 paragraph 2 BW). A draft will should be prevented from taking on a legal life of its own. Notaries will pay even more attention to the draft sent and the draft testator who, if the inheritance will previously expressed in draft is no longer wanted, will preferably cancel the draft inheritance law.

The conditions that livestock manure must meet in order to be used in organic farming do not appear to be worded in the same way in all language versions of the applicable EU regulations. The French Council of State therefore asked the EU Court of Justice (ECJ) for clarification. In a judgment of 4 October 2024, the ECJ first confirmed that, in principle, all language versions have the same value. If there are differences between the language versions with regard to a provision, the provision in question must be interpreted in the light of the general scheme and purpose of the legislation of which it forms a part. Unless the wording of a provision of European Union law expressly refers to the law of the Member States for the purposes of determining its meaning and scope, the rule must be given an autonomous and uniform interpretation throughout the Union. In accordance with that assessment framework, the ECJ subsequently explained that manure from ‘factory farming’ may not be used in organic farming. The concept of ‘landless livestock production’ used, inter alia, in the Dutch version is too narrow. The ECJ further clarified that ‘factory farming’ not only refers to the animal-unfriendly way in which animals are housed, but on all conditions under which both animals and the environment are treated.