Earlier this week animal rights campaigners celebrated the enforcement of the first round of the EU ban on the use of animals to test cosmetic ingredients.
It is now therefore illegal to test cosmetic ingredients on animals anywhere in the EU but British Union for the Abolition of Vivisection (BUAV) says its Human Cosmetics Standard still has a future.
Introduced in 1998, the standard demands that beauty companies remove animal testing from their entire supply chain. The strict requirements of the standard means it is now “more relevant than ever” according to Rebecca Ram, spokesperson for BUAV.
Ingedients testing banned in EU from March 11
Ram told CosmeticsDesign.com that while testing ingredients on animals was banned in the EU on March 11, there are exemptions to the “sales or marketing ban” on animal tested ingredients sold or imported into the EU.
The types of animal tests exempt from the sales and marketing ban cover carcinogenicity, photoallergy, cutaneous allergy, toxicokinetics, reprotoxicity, teratogenesis, toxicity – sub chronic and chronic, and photomutagenesis).
These animal tests will all be fully banned in the second leg of the seventh amendment to the Cosmetics Directive in 2013 but even after this date Ram said there would be a need for the Humane Cosmetics Standard.
Grey areas of dual purpose ingredients
She said “dual purpose ingredients” that have been tested on animals could still find their way onto beauty shelves. For example, a household product ingredient may be tested on animals and could then be added to a cosmetics formulation.
In addition, Ram said that even after the ban cosmetic products available in stores will still contain ingredients that have previously been tested on animals.
The BUAV therefore claims that its standard, symbolized by the leaping bunny logo, remains the only way for consumers to know that their products are cruelty free.
The animal rights group will also continue to campaign and promote the Humane Cosmetics Standard in countries outside the EU where no animal testing ban is in place.
For example, the BUAV will work with colleagues in the US Coalition for Consumer Information on Cosmetics, to promote the “leaping bunny” as the global standard for cruelty-free cosmetics.
Animal testing claims have increased sharply in the years running up to the EU ban. The frequency of ethical claims related to animals on newly launched beauty products increased six-fold globally between the beginning of 2006 and the end of 2007, according to figures from Mintel's Global New Products Database GNPD.