During the Cosmetic Valley Perfumes & Cosmetics congress, held on 4 and 5 November 2020, Céline Nowak and Sammy Drissi Amraoui, both editors in charge of cosmetic products within the DGCCRF’s Office of Health Products and Personal Services, presented an overview of the latest actions of their services in the framework of cosmetics market surveillance, with two main areas: “Natural” and “Organic” claims and nanomaterials. They also lifted the veil on their investigation themes for 2021.
In 2019, the DGCCRF worked on three main themes:
• The verification of the fairness of “natural” and “organic” claims
• The control of the quantities sold and the presence/labelling of allergens in the perfume compositions
• The use of nanomaterials in cosmetic products
In this context, 1,257 establishments were checked, 43% of which presented at least one anomaly.
395 products were sampled and analysed by the joint laboratory service, and a third were found to be non-compliant.
The anomalies noted fall into several categories:
• Non-compliance of labelling: 24%
• Absence or incompleteness of the product information file (PIF): 23%
• Misleading or unjustified claims: 16% (“a figure to be linked to the campaign of controls on ‘organic’ and ‘natural’ claims,” Céline Nowak said).
Other anomalies also include defects in CPNP notifications (10%) or product compositions containing prohibited substances (8%). These anomalies gave rise to 298 warnings, 203 injunctions, 60 reports, 17 prefectoral orders, 13 seizures and consignments (in the case of emergency measures for products containing dangerous substances).
“Natural” and “Organic” claims
This investigation was driven by the very strong growth in the use of these claims.
Controls were carried out with the Persons Responsible, but also …
