Launched by a collective of animal welfare organisations, the European Citizens’ Initiative (ECI) “Save cruelty-free cosmetics - Commit to a Europe without animal testing” has just reached the deadline for collecting signatures. With a result that allows the process to continue before the Commission and the European Parliament.
1,413,383: this is the number of signatures the organisers of this initiative claim to have collected.
After its registration by the European Commission on 30 June 2021, the ECI opened for signature collection on 31 August 2021. It had one year to gather more than one million signatures from citizens in at least seven different Member States. This has now been achieved.
The aim of this initiative is to strengthen the ban on cosmetics testing on animals, as the organisers denounce the fact that, despite the effective ban since 2013, animal testing continues to be required by European authorities, including on ingredients used only in cosmetics.
And they fear that the European CSS (Chemicals Strategy for Sustainable Development) “look set to massively increase the amount of regulatory animal testing taking place in Europe, including tests for cosmetics ingredients used in make-up, shampoo, moisturiser, soap, perfume and toothpaste”.
PETA points out that this is the second ECI on this issue to exceed one million signatures, after Stop Vivisection in 2015. To date, only six out of a total of 90 ECIs have passed this threshold.
“This massive number of signatures as well as the fact that this is the second time …
