Verbs: mandate

One of the news stories in our publication today used a familiar verb in an unfamiliar way (unfamiliar to me, at least). The clause that included the verb in question went something like this:

The EU directive mandated ongoing training

I was familiar with 'mandate' meaning "give (someone) authority to act in a certain way" (Concise OED, first sense given); I wasn't familiar with it meaning "make mandatory" (Concise OED, second sense given), which is obviously how it applies in the clause above.

Assuming that others might be thrown by this use of 'mandate', I recast the sentence along the lines of "The EU directive made ongoing training mandatory". But was that necessary or advisable? What do you think?