Even as toy manufacturers across the country are in the line of fire over the report published by an NGO citing the presence of high levels of toxics in toys, the Toy Association of India (TAI) has already made its first move to assuage the protestors. |
The association has decided to collaborate with Toxics Link, the same NGO, which had published the report on toy toxification, to come out with a national policy on toy safety to be submitted to the central government. |
"We strongly endorse the view that no toy manufacturer has any business to sell toys that contain toxins above the permissable limit. We have worked with Toxics Links in 2002 on the same issue and this time, we are very serious about forming a national policy on toy safety, which would ensure the strictest standards for each and every toy manufacturer in the country," RK Verma, president, TAI told Business Standard. |
India exports toys worth Rs 447 crore, while imports constitute Rs 237 crore worth of toys every year. None of the toys that are exported are toxic. If they were, the manufacturers would have not been according to international standards. |
TAI hopes to enforce safety measures in accordance with that for export market through the new policy, said Verma. |
Toxics Link, the Delhi-based NGO had published a study which had found alarming levels of lead and cadmium in soft polyvinyl chloride (PVC) toys. |
According to the report, lead and cadmium contain agents that can cause toxic effects on the nervous system and kidney. |
The NGO had picked up samples from large manufacturers as well as supply centres of unbranded toys in Delhi, Mumbai and Chennai. |
Big cities Mumbai and Delhi, account for nearly 95 per cent of toy production in India and the report cites that all the toy samples contained varying concentrations of lead and cadmium. |
Eight samples from Mumbai contained more than the US. Consumer Product Safety Commission standard of 200 parts per million (ppm) of lead in vinyl blinds, and five samples had more than 600 ppm of lead, which is the limit set by the US Environmental Protection Agency for painted toys. |
On the findings, Verma said, "A few rogue manufacturers cannot represent the entire toy manufacturing fraternity; however, the study has rightly reinforced the need for safety in the toys manufactured in the country." |
Currently, there are only three toy testing laboratories in the country, which are at Delhi, Mumbai and Chennai and have been established by the ministry of small scale industries and TAI. |
There is need to create more testing and verification laboratories in the country. The toy body is hoping to collaborate with the government for the same, he said. |