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BRUSSELS : China has made "considerable progress" in cracking down on exports of dangerous toys, the European Commission said on Thursday after threatening a ban amid waves of mass recalls.
With the key Christmas holiday season rapidly approaching, the European Union's executive arm had called on Chinese authorities to provide evidence that they were tackling the problem of unsafe toys.
In its analysis of Beijing's response, the Commission found "considerable progress by the Chinese authorities in taking corrective actions to stop the flow of dangerous goods onto the European market."
Tens of millions of Chinese-made toys have been recalled in recent months over concerns that they could be dangerous, in what has fast become a new flash point in trade relations between the Asian economic giant and Europe and the United States.
The world's largest toy maker, US company Mattel, has been at the centre of the storm, recalling millions of Chinese-made toys deemed to be unsafe although it has since admitted that many were due to design flaws.
Although EU Consumer Policy Commissioner Meglena Kuneva insisted that "the recalls were not a wake up call for us", she said that they helped concentrate minds on the problem of dangerous toys.
"Too many and too frequent high profile consumer product recalls have given us a clear signal that we cannot and should not ignore," she told journalists in Brussels.
"It is in China and the European Union's mutual interest to boost consumer confidence in the market," she said.
In September, the Commission raised the prospect of using bans if Chinese authorities failed to provide sufficient evidence that they were cracking down on the problem.
Amid growing public concern about dangerous toys from China, the Commission launched a broad stock-taking of its tools for detecting products deemed to be unsafe.
"In this world you cannot give 100 percent guarantees," Kuneva said. "But you can make sure the system is fit for purpose."
"I can assure you 100 percent of my commitment to keep the pressure on to ensure the highest possible level of safety for our citizens," she added.
Concerns about Chinese-made toys have loomed large over the review with nearly half the dangerous consumer products detected by European authorities coming from China.
However, Brussels said that China had rapidly stepped up the number of investigations it has carried out on tip-offs from the EU, with 184 probes from July to September, up sharply from only 84 in the previous 12 months.
European-prompted investigations had led to 93 export bans while Chinese authorities put in place a total of 700 bans independently of European warnings.
"Encouraged" that China was setting up an alert system based on one in Europe, Kuneva said she believed that "we will step up our cooperation" and that consumer product safety would be discussed at an EU-China summit next week in Beijing.
China is the world's top toy exporter, selling 22 billion toys overseas last year, or 60 percent of the world's total.
The BEUC European consumers association welcomed the Commission's efforts to improve the safety of toys coming from China, but stressed that primary responsibility remained with manufacturers, distributors and retailers.
"Whether they chose to have the products made in China or anywhere else, it is they who are responsible, and legally liable, for ensuring that their products are safe," the association said in a statement. - AFP/de
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