China still demands cosmetics animal tests, but change could be coming

It could be an animal rights campaigner’s worst nightmare: not only is the testing of cosmetics China allowed, it is in fact compulsory for all products. And this is going to cause problems to the international cosmetics sector. A comprehensive EU ban on testing cosmetics ingredients on animals which comes into force in March 2009 will create dilemmas for Chinese manufacturers seeking to export to Europe.

But actually the ban poses a potentially bigger threat for western firms seeking a share of China’s fast growing cosmetics markets, worth US$5bn in 2007 and set to grow at 10% per year up to 2015 according to the Chinese Ministry of Commerce. If China-sold cosmetics must be tested on animals, then what will EU manufacturers do to get their products to market?

Indeed, since China exports “hardly any” cosmetics to the EU the problem is one for foreign brands selling or manufacturing in China, said Professor Zhao Deming of the college of animal medicine at the China Agricultural University in Beijing.

The European Commission and several large western cosmetics firms have been persuading China to follow the EU’s lead. A spokesperson for the Cosmetics Working Group of the EU Chamber of Commerce in China, which represents major European brands, said that by not replacing animal testing China will “severely hinder” its own industry since Chinese exports will be barred from the EU.

A keenness to ensure market share for its cosmetics brands means China is ready to study alternatives but a lack of familiarity with alternatives is slowing the learning process. “Knowledge of alternatives [to animal testing] is limited but people have a very sincere interest in learning,” said Professor Coenraad Hendriksen of the Netherlands’ University of Utrecht, who presented his studies on alternative methods to animal testing at a conference in Beijing last November. The meeting was organised right after the Sixth World Congress on Alternatives and Animal Use in the Life Sciences, held in neighbouring Japan.

EU Chamber Cosmetics Working Group members have suggested to China a “gradual acceptance” of data on alternative testing methods, and offered support and resources to help China develop alternatives to replace animal testing. At last year’s conference China “wanted a very broad overview,” said Hendriksen.

Industry has demanded a reduction in the number of tests according to its 3Rs principles – reduce, refine and replace. Yet Chinese laboratories will need time to catch up. Hendriksen points to a local shortage of cell cultures, increasingly used as an effective and cheap alternative to animal testing. Chinese counterparts, he said, “want to know which methods we use and they will then decide based on availability if they will use them”. Zhao Deming agreed: China will “eventually” ban animal tests but it will take “a long time,” however. “The core problem is how to confirm the reliability of replacement methods.”

But there are signs that China is moving forward. The General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine (AQSIQ) in Guangdong province established China’s first laboratory to research replacement of cosmetics animal tests in February 2007.

Set in the China’s cosmetics manufacturing heartland, the new laboratory is a first for China and “will set the foundations” for responding to the EU’s new rules. By 2009 the lab will have introduced new standards, compliant with EU as well as OECD (Organisation for Economic Cooperation & Development) testing norms, “which will be applied in cosmetics safety supervision”.

Professor He Zhengming, senior researcher at the National Institute for the Control of Pharmaceutical and Biological Products predicts there will likely be more such centres regionally. “China will need to be ready for future changes to EU and US regulations on testing,” he said

Professors He and Zhao Deming are both members of a newly established Animal Test Replacement Research Society which invites academics and industry to present reports on 3R principles and new methods. Experiments being conducted through the society on cell culture are “going smoothly,” said Zhao.

And these developments could ultimately create an outsourcing boom for China: multinational cosmetics firms outsource testing to China because it’s cheaper and government here is not compelled to collect or release data on testing, said Ashley Fruno, senior campaigner at PETA’s Asia Pacific office in Hong Kong. “Laws protecting animals in laboratories are non-existent in China, so western companies don’t have to worry about compliance to the same degree.”

US-headquartered Procter & Gamble said its products won’t be affected by the EU ban coming into place. P&G, which in 2005 sponsored a Beijing conference on alternatives to animal testing, sees animal testing as a “last resort – it is the exception, and not the rule,” said company spokesperson Sabrina Heymans. “Sometimes, when absolutely necessary, and when required to do so by law, we must conduct research to ensure materials are safe and effective.”

China, warned the EU Chamber’s Cosmetics Working Group, is “at the very beginning” of learning about alternatives to animal testing. Professor Zhao says China will gradually tighten regulations on doing animal tests for foreign cosmetics companies until local laws on animal testing are as strict as in foreign countries, “then… finally we'll remove this industry”.

Meanwhile, public attitudes to animal welfare have changed “a lot for the better” in China, according to Zhang Qing, vice president of the China Small Animal Protection Association. Established in 1992, the organisation was licensed as a non-governmental organisation in 2004 and since then has signed up more than 10,000 members across China.

A typical Chinese quest for innovation may be the best hope of change in China’s research community. “There is a feeling in China that alternatives [to animal testing] are more innovative,” said Hendriksen.