China bans lead paint in US toy exports

[AllyCat]

Source: AP

WASHINGTON (AP) - China signed an agreement Tuesday to prohibit the use of lead paint on toys exported to the United States.

Unveiled at the second joint U.S-China summit on consumer product safety, the pact was negotiated in the wake of the recalls of millions of playthings decorated with paint containing the toxic metal.

In the pact, Beijing also pledged to step up inspections of its exports and take other steps to ensure that those products meet U.S. standards, said Nancy Nord, acting head of the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission. That will include joint efforts by the two countries to increase understanding of those standards among manufacturers and exporters.

The absence of such an understanding allowed paint suppliers to provide lead paint to companies making toys sold by Mattel Inc. and other companies, said Chuanzhong Wei, vice minister of China's General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine. Lead paint has been banned on toys made in the U.S. since 1978.



Read more: http://www.tdsmetro.net/news.php?story=33637

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Okay, so I had a few thoughts in my head on this:

1) Does anyone believe them?

2) Why is it that no manufacturer up to now mentioned that we don't allow that in our toys?

3) Why do they keep reporting "excess lead" in toys? Isn't ANY lead excess? I think the CPSC gave China a different level of standards to keep them happy.

4) So they are going to police their own stuff? Right...

[HereSince1628]

1. When the US bans import and backs it up with product inspections

and quarantines at US ports then Chinese goods will be safe.

In other words, NEVER.

[AllyCat]

2. I'm still not buying this crap.

I just bought a bunch of American-made wooden toys from Nova Naturals.

Little Tikes makes a number of their things in the US, but you have to check the label on each one to be sure.

[emilyg]

4. Neither am I.

[Crayson]

16. The only answer ... don't buy the shit anymore.

- Go back to carving the toys of your child yourself, as your grandpa did.
- Don't paint the toys, children are overstimulated in todays world anyways!!
No need of squeaking, babbling, glowing, blinking toys!
And people wonder when their child doesn't sleep right or suffers from ADS and can't sit still for a minute.

I recently had to buy a present for my godfather child and I had honestly NO IDEA what kind of shit I should give him!
Rows upon rows of plastic toys, one more terrible, loud, useless, stupid than the next!

I found NONE that would be useful for the childs fantasy, that the child could play with in different play schemes, most are totally onesided and boring after 5 minutes!

[tridim]

20. Buy Lego.. Non toxic, high quality plastic, and made in Denmark

Not to mention Lego actually stimulates creativity in children (and even some adults), which IMO is the whole point of toys. Most toy makers have forgotten that.

[tridim]

3. Gee thanks China.. Please don't stop selling us your cheap crap!

:eyes:

[valerief]

5. I don't care how many manufacturers' heads China cuts off, I don't

trust them, because I don't trust the U.S. to inspect imports.

[NYC]

6. Key question:

2) Why is it that no manufacturer up to now mentioned that we don't allow that in our toys?


If the manufacturers (importers) didn't want lead in toys or lead paint on toys, they would have made that clear. In other words, they made no efforts to meet U.S. standards.

[AllyCat]

7. I could have sworn I heard the CPSC relaxed restrictions on many things

in the past 5 years or so to make it easier for manufacturers to use cheaper materials in China that are banned here.

I've told this story many times before now, but an example:

Melissa and Doug (high-end, expensive, wooden toys) are all made in China. When I called the company to find out what type of paint they used, the CSR kept repeating the mantra, "we comply with all US regulations". I finally asked point-blank if they used lead paint on the toys and she would NOT answer the direct question. Just that they meet US standards.

I took that to mean they use lead-based paint and the US allows them to do so. I've never tested them, but I'm curious.

I still blame the manufacturers and they are only recalling because a few have been caught and they want to make it look like they are "doing something about it".

Forget it. I'm done with China. Yuk.

Boycott the friggin' Olympics too.

[Mnemosyne]

11. Molly Ivan's book - 'Bushwhacked' mentions the destruction many of the regulations

put in place by Clinton's terms. Remember several listeria and ecoli breakouts, iirc.

Great questions!

It was baffling as to why China was picked to hold the Olympics anyway, to me. Does the world not recall Tiananmen Square??

"The largest public square in the world, covering 40 ha/98 acres and lying S of the Ming Tiananmen (‘Gate of Heavenly Peace’) leading into the Forbidden City in C Beijing. It has long been the venue of mass manifestations (eg in the May Fourth Movement, 1919) and it was here that the People's Republic was proclaimed in September 1949. In 1966, during the Cultural Revolution, Mao Zedong addressed rallies of over a million Red Guards in the square. In June 1989, it was the scene of mass protests by students and others against the Chinese government, crushed by troops of the Chinese Army with an undisclosed number of dead. To the S stands a 36 m/120 ft marble monument to the People's Heroes."

http://www.reference.com/search?r=13&q=Tiananmen

Heinous and despicable monsters lead China too, imo.

[NYC]

12. I fully agree with you.

I'm trying to phrase my questions carefully when I ask where something was made, and what ingredients were used.

It's a shame we can't just buy products without worrying.

[onehandle]

8. Ban Chinese Imports!

They cost us jobs and poison our children.

[BadgerKid]

9. Just export to Mexico and truck 'em over the border. n/t

[AllyCat]

10. Not if the Senate has anything to say about it. They just voted

75-24 to ban Mexican trucking in the US. It's part of the transport bill so who knows what will change between now and then.

[Igel]

13. 1) Really doesn't matter, does it?

2) Because most people know it.

3) No. I think China's legal system allows 90 ppm lead in paint on toys and the US allows somewhat more. But that's what they allow for domestic use as well. In other words, it's like freedom of the press in the USSR: Nice on paper, but you just don't to see it in action. (And I have no idea where I got the "90 ppm" ... I read it some place in the last few days, and I'm not about to try to pin it down.)

4) Supposedly. See (3) for clarification on how *that* would work.

[area51]

14. "The absence of such an understanding allowed paint suppliers ..."

Riiiight. Because when one makes toys for children, one of the first ingredients most people reach for is lead. </sarcasm>

[tridim]

21. My Dad told me he used to buy raw mercury at the pharmacy to play with

Times have changed, except apparently not in China.

[booley]

15. So nice of them to get around to that

I mean, we've only known that lead paint was bad for kids for what? 50 or 60 years?

[durablend]

17. Don'tcha worry about that

Bushco has a plan to render all those studies proving the conequences of lead paint to be just a load of hogwash (just like global warming, inflation, the "two Americas" theory, etc.)

[rocktivity]

18. Didn't China KNOW that there can't be lead in American toys?

Didn't the U.S. companies TELL them? Or were the labor costs too attractive?

:mad:
rocknation

[Javaman]

19. But it's still okay for the chinese! wow, just wow. nt