The European Commission has pledged to accelerate the phasing out of animal testing in response to a European Citizens' Initiative (ECI) signed by 1.2 million people.
Brussels said it would create and implement a roadmap towards animal-free chemical safety assessment.
The roadmap will serve as a framework for reducing and ultimately eliminating animal testing in the context of chemicals legislation.
The Commission is also proposing to initiate a series of actions to accelerate the reduction of animal testing in research, education and training, including exploring the possibility to coordinate the activities of EU member states and national authorities in this field, exploratory workshops, and sustaining new training initiatives for early career scientists.
Brussels emphasised that the EU Cosmetics Regulation already prohibits the placing on the market of cosmetic products that have been tested on animals.
However, this ban does not extend to safety tests required to assess risks from chemicals to workers and the environment under the EU Regulation on the Registration, Evaluation, Authorisation, and Restriction of Chemicals (REACH).
The response to the ‘Save Cruelty-Free Cosmetics – Commit to a Europe without Animal Testing' ECI was criticized by Unilever, which said the Commission is “completely failing to protect or strengthen the cosmetics animal testing ban”.
The ECI, which Unilever backs, calls on Brussels to uphold the ban on all testing on animals for cosmetics ingredients for any purpose at any time.
“The Commission highlighted that the interface between the EU cosmetics and chemicals regulations is currently subject to two cases before the EU Court of Justice, so it will await the outcome of these before considering any potential legislative changes that could protect or strengthen the cosmetics animal testing ban,” said a Unilever statement.
“While we don’t have a positive outcome on this yet, with 1.2 million European citizens showing their support for the ban on animal testing for cosmetics, we remain hopeful that the Commission will act to protect it,” it adds.
