In my last post, I discussed the growing phenomenon of e-commerce sales directly to consumers from foreign (Chinese) manufacturers. My concern is that the regulatory stance of the CPSC—asserting that a foreign manufacturer is legally responsible for compliance with all U.S. safety standards when a U.S. consumer buys a product directly from that manufacturer—is both naïve and unenforceable.
Therefore, I was interested to see the announcement last week from the CPSC that it has entered into a voluntary agreement with Alibaba, the Chinese e-commerce direct sales company, to work with the agency to try to monitor its platforms for dangerous products. Kudos to the agency for negotiating this agreement, as modest as it is.
According to press reports, Alibaba handles more e-commerce business than Amazon.com and eBay Inc. combined and, as a platform for third parties, it controls as much as 80 per cent of the Chinese e-commerce business. Obviously, Alibaba can be a potent ally in policing the marketplace for unsafe products.
Looking at the reported details of the agreement, it is not clear whether it will prove to advance consumer safety in the global e-mall or merely serve as a fig leaf to which the parties can point to show they are doing something. Alibaba has apparently agreed to block sales of up to 15 recalled products upon request from the CPSC. Since a substantial number of the over-400 recalls the CPSC does each year are of products from China, there should be no problem finding candidates for this list. All concede that this agreement is not enforceable. It remains to be seen how aggressive Alibaba will be carrying it out over time.
More interesting is the company’s agreement to make available information about safety requirements to importers into the United States. U.S. safety requirements are not easily understood, especially those issued since 2009 in response to the CPSIA—see the labyrinthine regulations dealing with testing and certification for examples. Any way to get information to those who are honestly trying to comply can do nothing but help.
Whether this agreement is a modest, but effective first step or just another counterfeit product remains to be seen. Stay tuned.
testing laboratories to a wide range of standards including, but not limited to those issued by the CPSC. My presentation was an opportunity to discuss how the agency has implemented the CPSIA with a special focus on the agency’s testing requirements. However, this was also an opportunity to have a free-wheeling conversation about the role that testing and testing laboratories play, and should play, in product safety.
“Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” Albert Einstein
Published February 25, 2014 Burden Reduction , Comment Request , Testing Leave a CommentTags: burden reduction, CPSC, Testing Rule
For the third (or is it the fourth?) time in as many years, the CPSC is again “addressing” the issue of reducing third-party testing burdens. For those who have already
commented repeatedly on this issue, Einstein’s definition of insanity may seem especially apt. In spite of direction from the Congress to either address testing burdens on its own or report on appropriate statutory authority needed to do so, the agency has repeatedly asked for comment but done nothing to actually reduce the testing burdens that have been so well documented.
This time the agency has announced that it will be holding a workshop, on April 3, focusing on reducing testing burdens associated with the regulations dealing with phthalates and lead content and the eight substances listed in the ASTM F-963 Toy Standard. The purpose is consider whether it is possible to determine that certain materials, irrespective of manufacturing origin or process, will always comply with agency regulations and therefore do not need testing. The agency is interested in worldwide production processes—past, current and, interestingly, future—but only with respect to the three areas noted above. In other words, tell them how past and current materials and manufacturing processes, and looking into a crystal ball, those that might be used in the future throughout the world show that the existing regulations in the three areas always will be complied with. Anything else is outside the scope of this inquiry.
Because the agency’s scope of inquiry is so narrow, it follows that any relief coming out of it will also be very narrow. So while I encourage either comments (due by April 17) or participation in the workshop (sign up by March 13), I do not have high hopes that meaningful burden reduction will be the end product. At best, there might be a slight adjustment to the list of materials the agency has determined do not and cannot contain lead and, hence, do not need testing. The further development of a list of materials determined not to have phthalates and the other substances listed in the toy standard may also be of help. At worst, the information collected will go into the maw of the agency and be digested with the other information the agency has already collected, but with no further useful output any time soon, other than for the agency to look like it is busy doing something.
There have been many practical suggestions made over the past three years that, if implemented, would reduce the needless waste of resources that the testing requirements have added to the supply chain and which consumers have to pay for. But the agency has been operating in a world that values endless process over meaningful results.
Einstein also said “We can’t solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them.” Unfortunately, it does not look like any new thinking will be happening soon.