Are Your Kids’ Bags Safe? Carcinogens Found in AliExpress Products

Potentially carcinogenic substances exceeding the standard by up to 56 times were found in children’s bags sold on AliExpress, a Chinese overseas direct purchase platform. As harmful substances are detected in large quantities in infant and children’s products sold on Chinese e-commerce platforms, there is a demand for countermeasures.

Last month, on the 8th, the City of Seoul announced that harmful substances exceeding the allowable limit were detected in eight infant and children’s products in a safety investigation of 31 closely related products sold on AliExpress.

The subjects of the investigation were 19 children’s products (8 items) that topped the overseas platform sales rate and 12 household textile products and other living goods (3 items), a total of 31 items. The items were tested for harmful chemical substance detection, durability (mechanical and physical characteristics), etc. The investigation was conducted by the Korea Construction Living Environment Testing Research Institute (KCL), KATRI Testing Research Institute, and FITI Testing Research Institute, designated national technical standards safety certification institutions.

The products judged to be inappropriate due to the inspection are children’s water play tube walkers, wooden magnetic fishing toys, candy-shaped teething toys, banana-shaped teething toys, character pencils, eraser pencils, and children’s leather bags, a total of 8 items.

Of these, four types of phthalate plasticizers (DEHP·DBP·DINP·DIBP) used in plastic processing were detected in children’s leather bags, and their total was 55.6 times the standard. Phthalate plasticizers have reproductive toxicity, such as infertility, and among them, DEHP(diethylhexyl phthalate) is a potential human carcinogen (grade 2B) designated by the International Cancer Research Institute.

Phthalate plasticizers exceeding 33 times the standard were also detected in children’s water play products (tubes). This product’s thickness was thinner (0.19mm) than the domestic standard (0.25mm), so the risk was high.

Phthalate plasticizers were also detected in two pencils (DEHP 33 times~35 times) and wooden magnetic fishing toys (DBP 2.2 times).

There were many physical defects, such as durability, in toys that directly touch the mouth or skin of infants. As a result of the examination of the teething toys (2 types), toys in which infants who start to have teeth bite with their mouths, the design and shape had a high possibility of blocking the airway. There was a risk of suffocation as they were easily damaged by small forces. Walkers could be cut or stuck in the product gap, increasing the risk of falling.

The City of Seoul pointed out that consumers can be exposed to risks such as harmful substances and durability defects without any safety inspection when overseas direct purchases are imported into Korea. According to Statistics Korea, the amount of overseas direct purchases by domestic consumers last year increased by 28.3% from the previous year to 6.8 trillion won ($6 billion). While the U.S. direct purchase was the trend, nearly half (48.7%) were Chinese companies due to the offensive of the Chinese platform last year. In particular, Ali, which is growing rapidly in China, ranked second in the domestic market with a monthly active user count of 8.18 million as of February. Temu, a latecomer, is also quickly eroding the domestic market.

Based on the safety inspection results, the City of Seoul will intensively promote protective measures such as intensive investigation of the harmfulness of products sold on overseas online platforms and consumer damage remedies. It operates a regular safety inspection system centered on China’s representative online platforms such as Altesh (Ali, Temu, Shein). From the fourth week of April, it discloses the inspection results to citizens every week to prevent damage. It sets up a dedicated reporting center for consumer damage to overseas direct purchase products and conducts a large-scale citizen campaign aiming for sustainable value consumption with consumer groups.

Song Ho Jae, Seoul City’s Labor, Fairness, and Coexistence Policy Officer, said, “Overseas direct purchase products that are easily consumed because they are cheap do not apply domestic safety standards so that damage can occur at any time. Consumers need to be careful,” and “We will actively work to minimize consumer damage by operating a dedicated reporting center for related consumer damage and establishing a systematic and regular safety inspection system.”