China Will No Longer Require Animal Testing On Cosmetic Products

A lot more brands will hopefully be going down the cruelty-free route in the near future, because the Chinese government has announced that, by 2020, long-contested laws that made animal testing compulsory will finally be lifted.

If you didn’t already know, lots of big cosmetic companies still test their products on animals, despite the fact that there are lots of ethical ways to test the safety of a product without hurting living creatures. Most companies will say that the reason they do this is because they sell in China, and therefore their products must be tested on animals.

Historically, the £28 billion Chinese beauty industry was under strict instruction from the government to submit all cosmetic products for animal testing if they want to sell them in China.

Now, after years of lobbying, the Institute for In Vitro Sciences (IIVS) has announced that the Chinese government has approved nine non-animal based methods, with the new legislation coming into play in 2020.

So what does this mean for the beauty community? Basically, brands can now decide if they want to continue testing on animals as it is no longer compulsory for a Chinese market. Hopefully this means lots of big brands will go cruelty-free.

Yay for ethical makeup!

• Cosmetic testing