The complaint concerns a request to the European Commission for public access to a list containing information, from Member State authorities, about exports of breeding cattle from Germany to non-EU countries in the year 2020. The complainant objected to the failure by the Commission do deal with his request within the applicable timeframe.

The Ombudsman found that the Commission was justified in extending the deadline for dealing with the request, due to the exceptional nature of the information on the list. However, she found that the Commission should have better explained the delay. The Ombudsman closed the inquiry urging the Commission to reply to the complainant’s access request without further delay.