The European Parliament has voted in favor of imposing a minimum 30% quota for European content on Amazon, Netflix, HBO and other streaming services. Member states are allowed to raise the quota to 40%.

European content quota
When the legislation was first proposed in 2016, EU lawmakers wanted Netflix and others to fill their catalog with at least 20% Europe-made content. This has since been revised up to a minimum of 30%.

The European Parliament has voted in favor of the 30% content quota (452 for – 132 against). The deal still needs to be formally approved by the Council of EU ministers after which member states will have 21 months to transpose the new rules into national law.

- ”In order to support the cultural diversity of the European audiovisual sector, MEPs ensured that 30% of content in the video-on-demand platforms’ catalogues should be European,” the European Parliament announced.



The new rules for audiovisual media services allow member states to raise the content quota to 40%, which can include a quota for local production. This content must be given prominent placement in the user interface.

Later this month, EU will publish figures showing the percentage of European content available today on the various streaming services.

- Source: EU Parliament