GNBS seeking help from laboratories in the US to conduct tests on lead levels in painted toys

The Guyana National Bureau of Standards (GNBS) is seeking to tighten its monitoring operations in an effort to ensure that seasonal imports, including toys and other goods associated with Christmas, are compliant with labeling requirements and safety standards, according to the Head of the Bureau’s Public Relations Department, Evadnie Benfield.

The GNBS is collaborating with the Trade and Customs Administration to monitor the imports of toys, decorative lights and other electrical equipment usually imported to meet the high Christmas demand and Benfield said that officers attached to the Bureau will also be inspecting outlets to ensure compliance with labeling and safety standards.

While the GNBS has recently received clearance to establish a facility at the Cheddi Jagan International Airport, Timehri to strengthen its monitoring capability, Benfield conceded that the high volume of trans-border imports will still pose a challenge to the efforts of the Bureau to restrict the importation of unsafe toys and improperly labeled or unlabeled goods. She said that visits by officers to outlets was designed to determine whether goods that may have escaped monitoring mechanisms at legal ports of entry may be on sale at local shops.

Toy imports into Guyana have come under closer scrutiny by the Bureau in the wake of reports that surfaced in the United States and elsewhere earlier this year of the appearance on the international market of toys manufactured in China under a well-known international brand, that contained high levels of lead in paint used in the manufacture of the toys. Benfield told Stabroek Business that a search instituted by the Bureau in the wake of the report had turned up none of those toys here but said that given the particular challenges associated with the monitoring of toy imports into Guyana the GNBS was seeking to heighten its vigilance during the holiday period.

Benfield said that increasing international concerns over the manufacture and sale of dangerous toys had placed an increased level of responsibility on the Bureau. She said that in the absence of local laboratory facilities to conduct tests to determine the level of lead in paints used in the manufacture of some toys, the Bureau had sought but had been unable to locate such testing facilities in the Caribbean. According to Benfield the GNBS had identified some laboratories in the United States that have the capacity to conduct such tests and was seeking to identify a facility with which it could collaborate in order to reduce the level of unsafe toys imported into the country.

Toy sales ahead of Christmas 2007, however, are already well underway and any new scientific testing facility implemented by the GNBS is unlikely to be available in the short- term.

Meanwhile, Stabtroek Business has visited a number of toy outlets in the city where reputable brands of a wide assortment of toys are available for sale. A spokesman for one of the outlets told this newspaper, however, that while the more reputable outlets have been seeking to comply with GNBS standards and safety regulations, other less well-established outlets and street vendors are offering toys for sale that may have been imported illegally and that in those cases compliance with safety and standards regulations could not be verified. The businessman told Stabroek Business that given the fact that large amounts of toys were illegally imported from neighbouring countries during the Christmas period, it was likely that a higher volume of such toys may be on sale at outlets and by vendors outside of Georgetown. Some vendors in Georgetown with whom Stabroek Business spoke said that they had purchased toys from various wholesalers and that they were not aware of the GNBS’ safety and standards considerations.

Benfield has told Stabroek Business that the Bureau is empowered to seize toys that are considered unsafe or not compliant with manufacturing standards.