Pilgrims progress with Chinese toys…..Vandana Vasudevan
In the past two decades, toys made in China have been repeatedly found to be toxic by the US and Europe and yet 70% of the toys available in the Indian market are Chinese
In the past two decades, toys made in China have been repeatedly found to be toxic by the US and Europe and yet 70% of the toys available in the Indian market are Chinese
There I was in a south Indian temple town, Kanchivaram saree flapping in the breeze, hair tied up, cloth bag swinging on one arm, my inner Tamilian mami fully unleashed. It was liberating, this freedom from role playing and living up to an image. Alone and far away from the trappings of my urban professional life in Delhi. Away from traffic and malls and in-your-face consumerist culture. Then, my illusion broke when I saw something familiar. Ben 10 toys. Loads of them stacked in the shops skirting the road to the temple. The light green and black package with the drawing of an angry floppy haired boy, was everywhere. As I walked along, I saw heaps and heaps of cheap Chinese toy cars wrapped in the thin plastic that is distinctive of such goods. Imitation Barbies jostled for space with lockets and laminated photos of the presiding deity of the town. Something called Flying Bald Eagle was on demo in many shopsa bird on a string, flying eerily in circles over your head. Soft toys were stuffed into ledges and shelves of the small shops competing for display space with devotional music and shloka DVDs. I found that the last leg of the production cycle was happening right there in the shop: the shopkeepers took the cloth frame of the animal, reached out into a sack and took out a handful of synthetic fibre, stuffed it into the skeletal framework and zipped it up. The soft toy was ready, though the external cloth was in lurid colours and had a strange sheen to it, very unlike the matte finish cotton or velvet coverings of good quality soft toys.
A shopkeeper told me that the toys were from China and came to a local wholesale dealer from Bangalore. I asked another vendor whether demand for these toys was good.
Yes, many people buy, he said. I saw that it was true. Many parents were taking time off from divine pursuits and buying cheap Chinese toys for their children.
I have seen the same scene in Tirupati, where shops lining the approach to the temple are filled with Chinese toys. If theres such a huge availability of toys in a pilgrim centre, obviously theres commensurate demand. So a lot of children are asking their parents to buy them a toy, possibly as a reward for standing in lines in temples, and parents are complying willingly. I dont remember so many distractions existing in temple towns when we were growing up. So something has obviously changed in the parent-child-God equation. But this being a consumer column, lets leave that aside and focus on the toys themselves, which are of course crowding all our bazaars and not just our pilgrim centres.
In the past two decades, toys made in China have been repeatedly found to be toxic by the US and Europe. In 2007, even a reputed brand like Mattel Inc. had to recall roughly seven million toys for containing excessive levels of lead. Apparently, at that time, the factory in China had outsourced its production to another firm, which had used lead-ridden paint. A November 2011 study by Greenpeace-IPEN measured toxic metals in 500 toys purchased in five Chinese cities. It was the first organized, large-scale investigation of toxicity in childrens products in China. They tested for six metals known to seriously affect the immunity of children: lead, arsenic, antimony, cadmium, chromium and mercury. Almost one-third contained at least one of these metals and one in 10 contained lead. The US Centre for Disease Control and Prevention has warned that even minimal exposure to lead is not acceptable for children and that they should never come into contact with it. Lead can be ingested through chewing of infant teethers and can enter the body by touching the harmful toys and even by inhalation.
Whats the Indian government doing about it, given that 70% of the toys available in the Indian market are from China? The ministry of commerce banned imports of Chinese toys in January 2009. In March 2009, in bilateral talks in New Delhi, the Chinese government cried foul, pointing out that the ban violated World Trade Organisation norms and was prejudicial and possibly a ploy to protect domestic toy makers. All right, said India, well make safety norms for all toys, whether domestic or imported.
In 2007, the Consumer Welfare Association in Mumbai filed a public interest litigation seeking action against the sale of toxic toys, especially cheap Chinese ones. In March 2011, the Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS) admitted in court that toys made of PVC contain phthalates, which makes the plastic chewy. It is a chemical that it agreed had ill effects on children, so their levels must be regulated, especially in those toys which toddlers chewed. Hallelujiah. The governmental behemoth actually stirred a bit after four years. In September 2011, BIS drafted new norms for phthalate content in toys for children under the age of four and said the content should be under 0.1%, the safe limit under European Union standards. But it doesnt cover toys for children above the age of four and has other shortcomings. Toy manufacturers are sceptical as there is very little infrastructure to test the presence of phthalates in toys.
I share their scepticism. Its quite clear no one is regulating this sector. The hordes taking home toxic toys along with Gods blessings that I saw in the pilgrim town the other day was proof enough.
Vandana Vasudevan is a graduate from the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad, and writes on mass urban consumer issues.
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