New Toy Safety Standard EN 71-3:2013 for Soluble Elements

HONG KONG, China - July 16, 2013 - PRLog -- The standard is expected to be harmonized under the Toy Safety Directive 2009/48/EC (TSD) upon official acceptance by the European Commission (EC) and by publication in the Official Journal of the European Union (OJEU) before the enforcement date for chemicals on 20 July 2013.

On 5 June 2013, the new toy safety standard EN 71-3:2013 ‘Safety of toys Part 3: Migration of certain elements’ was published by the Comité Européen de Normalisation (CEN, European Committee for Standardization). The method details the extraction of soluble elements from toy materials using conditions which simulate the material remaining in contact with gastric juices for a certain time after swallowing.  

The soluble elements are essentially determined by three different methods. The more stringent limits for soluble barium have, in principle, been agreed and are reflected in the standard (see Table 1). These new limits are currently undergoing an administrative process for their official revision to the Toy Safety Directive 2009/48/EC (TSD).

The new standard EN 71-3:2013 is now available on a commercial basis at the national standards organizations, such as British Standards Institution (BSI)(http://shop.bsigroup.com/en/ProductDetail/?pid=0000000000...). It is widely expected that the new standard will be officially accepted by the EC and harmonized under the TSD by publication in the OJEU before the enforcement date of 20 July 2013.

Chemical standard requirements for juvenile products also have an important role in the demonstration of conformity for soluble elements.  With the availability of the new EN 71-3:2013 standard, the application of the latest version of EN 71-3 for soluble elements for juvenile products is already applicable for some standards only and is expected in the future for all juvenile products . A new SGS SafeGuardS will be published soon on this subject.

Highlights of the new standard are summarized in Table 1 (http://newsletter.sgs.com/eNewsletterPro/uploadedimages/0...) within the latest SGS SafeGuardS bulletin.

About SGS Services for Toys and Juvenile Products

SGS offers a wide range of services to ensure that your products comply with the EU Toy Safety Directive (http://www.sgs.com/en/Consumer-Goods-Retail/Toys-and-Juve...). The companyoffers training, safety/risk assessment, technical documentation check, labeling review, testing according to harmonized standards, SVHC screening, inspections and audits. With the largest global network of toy experts and testing facilities around the world, around 20 toy labs worldwide including five EU Notified Bodies (France, UK, Germany, Netherlands and Turkey), SGS is the partner to trust.

Please do not hesitate to contact the SGS experts for further information.

Contact details:

SGS Consumer Testing Services
HingWo Tsang
Senior Technical Services Manager
SGS Hong Kong Ltd.
5-8/F, 28/F, Metropole Square, 2 OnYiu Street, SiuLek Yuen
Shatin, NT, Hong Kong, China

t: +852 2774 7420
Email: cts.media@sgs.com
Website: http://www.sgs.com/en/Consumer-Goods-Retail/Toys-and-Juvenile-Products.aspx

SGS is the world’s leading inspection, verification, testing and certification company. SGS is recognized as the global benchmark for quality and integrity. With more than 75 000 employees, SGS operates a network of over 1 500 offices and laboratories around the world.