On December 13, 2023, the European Chemicals Agency (ECHA) released the tenth enforcement report of the REACH Enforcement Forum. This enforcement focused on consumer products and inspected their compliance with the Restriction of Hazardous Substances (RHS) regulations, the POPs Regulation, the RoHS Directive, and the Toys Directive, as well as the information transmission of SVHC in articles. A total of 2,407 products in 26 countries were inspected. The overall non-compliance rate of the 2,407 products inspected in this enforcement inspection was 18%, the non-compliance rate of article-type products was 20%, and the non-compliance rate of mixture-type products was 9%. Inspection data showed that the content of harmful chemicals such as lead, phthalates, and short-chain chlorinated paraffins in products sold to consumers was too high. Compliance with the Restriction of Hazardous Substances In the enforcement inspection of compliance with the Restriction of Hazardous Substances, it was found that the RoHS Directive had the highest non-compliance rate, with 49% of the 329 inspected products not meeting the requirements. The second highest non-compliance rate was the Restriction of Hazardous Substances section (Appendix 1).
Restriction of Hazardous Substances Compliance
During enforcement inspections of Restriction of Hazardous Substances compliance, the RoHS Directive had the highest non-compliance rate, with 49% of 329 inspected products failing to comply. This was followed by the REACH Regulation (Annex 17), with 13% of 2,038 inspected products failing to comply. The Toys Directive came in third, with 10% of 218 inspected products failing to comply. Finally, the POPs Regulation came in last, with 9% of 645 inspected products failing to comply.
The most common types of violating products are:
☑ Electrical equipment, such as electric toys, chargers, cables, and headphones,52% of these products were found to be non-compliant, primarily due to excessive levels of lead in solder, phthalates in flexible plastic components, and cadmium in circuit boards.
☑ Sports equipment, such as yoga mats, cycling gloves, balls and rubber grips for sports equipment, of which 18% were found to be non-compliant, mainly due to excessive levels of short-chain chlorinated paraffins and phthalates in soft plastics and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons in rubber.
☑ Toys, such as bath/water toys, dolls, clothing, play mats, plastic figures, stress relief toys, outdoor toys, sharpie and childcare toys, 16% of non-electrical toys were found to be non-compliant, mainly due to excessive levels of phthalates and other restricted substances such as polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, nickel, boron or nitrosamines found in soft plastic parts.
Fashion products such as handbags, jewelry, belts, shoes and clothing, 15% of which do not comply due to the presence of phthalates, lead and cadmium.
REACH SVHC Message transmission
Regarding the REACH SVHC information transfer obligation, i.e. the requirement of Article 33 (1) of the REACH Regulation, a total of 589 article types were inspected and it was found that among the 10 products that met the information transfer obligation conditions, the suppliers of 3 products did not fulfill their obligation to provide the required SVHC information to their professional recipients, with a non-compliance rate of 30%.
Enforcement measures
Following inspections, national law enforcement agencies have taken a range of enforcement measures, including verbal or written warnings, fines, criminal prosecution, and product destruction. On the other hand, most of the violating companies have also taken voluntary actions, such as removing the violating products from their shelves, deleting them from their websites or online platforms, and recalling them.
Future law enforcement developments
In early December 2023, the ECHA Enforcement Forum published its 2024-2025 work plan on the ECHA website, identifying EU-level enforcement priorities for REACH, the CLP Regulation, the PIC Regulation, the POPs Regulation, and the Biocidal Products Regulation (BPR). These measures include actions in areas with a higher risk of non-compliance, such as online sales, imported articles, and compliance with classification and labeling or restriction requirements.
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