Some toymakers are “flooding” Europe with dangerous toys via online marketplaces, including magnets capable of puncturing a child’s intestines if swallowed and products containing toxic chemicals, according to an industry body.
Toy Industries of Europe, which represents toy manufacturers in the European Union and the United Kingdom, has said it recently bought more than 100 toys from third-party sellers on 10 online marketplaces — Amazon (AMZN) among them — and found that 80% of the toys failed to meet EU safety standards, presenting a potential “danger to children.”
“Unsafe toys from sellers who ignore EU rules will keep flooding the EU unless online marketplaces are given more responsibility for the safety of the toys sold on their platform where no-one else in the EU has that responsibility,” Catherine Van Reeth, director general of TIE, said in a statement Thursday. “Unless every player in the value chain has to play its part, a legal loophole will remain.”
The products studied were sold by both EU and non-EU traders on marketplaces including low-cost Chinese platforms Temu and Shein, alongside Amazon.
An Amazon spokesperson said the company has “proactive measures in place to prevent unsafe or non-compliant products from being listed” on its site. “The products in question have been removed while we investigate,” they told CNN.
A Temu spokesperson told CNN that product quality and consumer safety were “top priorities” for the company. “All merchants on our platform must meet strict safety standards… We act swiftly on feedback, take prompt action to remove non-compliant products and address any issues,” they said.
A Shein spokesperson, meanwhile, told CNN that third-party sellers on its platform must comply with its “stringent product compliance standards” and that it had “immediately removed” the products in question from its site and was conducting an investigation.
As part of TIE’s research, independent laboratory tests were carried out on the products the group bought, which included a baby teething toy that could easily break into small parts, posing a risk of choking. It also found slime products containing levels of a chemical called boron over 13 times the EU’s legal limit. Boron can cause reproductive health problems, TIE noted.
The study’s results “do not reflect the safety of all toys available on these platforms,” the group said, noting that it had not bought any toys from well-known brands.
The EU has the “strictest toy safety regime in the world” but toymakers from outside the bloc are exempt from EU rules when selling their products via online marketplaces, TIE said.
Six of the 10 online marketplaces studied, including Amazon, have signed the EU’s Product Safety Pledge, a voluntary commitment to ensure the safety of the goods sold on their platforms by third parties, the industry body added, urging EU leaders to make such marketplaces legally responsible for the safety of products listed by third parties.
In the United States, too, regulators are concerned about the safety of goods sold online. In September, two officials from the Consumer Products Safety Commission called for an investigation into Shein and Temu over the potential sale of “deadly baby and toddler products.”
