News on fragrances: The 49th Amendment of IFRA

| Regulatory
Posted By: Trace One

What is IFRA?

fragrances2IFRA is the official self-regulatory representative body of the fragrance industry worldwide dedicated to ensure the safety of fragrance materials based on the risk assessment carried out by an independent Expert Panel.

Its role is to evaluate data on a fragrance ingredient to make sure there is no risk for the consumer and, in case the safety assessment does not support the current use, the Panel instructs IFRA to issue a Standard either restricting, banning or giving additional instructions for the material use. The list of standards is periodically modified and the IFRA 49th Amendment has been published on IFRA website on 10 January 2020.

IFRA 49th: what’s new?

The 49th Amendment of IFRA Standards brings relevant modifications to the existing regulatory framework of IFRA standard. The main modifications are consequences of the implementation of a new scientific approach for determining the safe use of fragrance ingredients.

One of the modifications consists in the revised methodology of Quantitative Risk Assessment for fragrance ingredients (QRA2). Moreover, the new approach of combining skin sensitization, phototoxicity and systemic toxicity assessment in one exercise leads to a change in the IFRA categorization system. In particular the 49th Amendment foresees a total of 12 categories (some of which are divided in subcategories), while the nomenclature “IFRA Classes” has become obsolete.

The new product categorization is achieved by grouping consumer product types based on functional type, area of use and whether they are rinse-off or leave-on applications.

As a consequence of the new methodology and categorisation system, many IFRA standards have been revised by the 49th Amendement and 25 new standards have been issued.

IFRA 49th: When?

The implementation timelines for the 49th Amendment of IFRA standards are as follows:

  • for new creations the date of enter into force is 13 months after the date of the letter of Notification (i.e. February 10th 2021)
  • for existig creations, the date of entering into force is 25 months after the date of the letter of Notification (February 10th 2022).

For further informations, please use the following links:

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