Toy Association staff recently attended meetings of the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) Technical Committee 181 on Toy Safety (TC 181), along with consumer product safety professionals from around the world, to advocate for global toy safety standards alignment and discuss areas for improvement.

Held in São Paulo, Brazil, the annual meetings of the technical committee and its various working groups discussed the ISO 8124 series of toy standards, which are intended to be usable as a common basis for regulations around the world.

Toy Association staff and experts from its member companies, as well as ASTM International, represented the U.S. delegation in the discussions, advocating for changes to the international toy standards to further promote child safety and to better align them with the stringent requirements of ASTM F963, the U.S. toy safety standard that is widely emulated by other countries. In all, 20 ISO member countries were represented in the meetings.¹ Delegates included representatives of governments, private sector companies, testing laboratories, consumer representatives, standards development organizations, and others.

Collaborating with global toy safety experts and fostering stronger partnerships remains a key component of The Toy Association’s safety and advocacy efforts. Questions about the ongoing ISO activity may be directed to The Toy Association’s Joan Lawrence and Jos Huxley, who were present at the meetings. Lawrence serves as chair of the ASTM Subcommittee on Toy Safety, and Huxley serves as convenor on the ISO working groups on mechanical and physical properties of toys and age determination guidelines.

¹Under the ISO standards process, countries and their national standards body (rather than individuals or companies) are the members of ISO. American National Standards Institute (ANSI) is the U.S. member of ISO and The Toy Association coordinates the activity on behalf of ANSI as administer of the U.S. Technical Advisory Group to ISO TC 181 on Toy Safety, bringing together U.S. subject matter experts to formulate U.S. positions on matters before TC 181.