Nederlandse Voedsel-en Warenautoriteit

Dangerous consumer products can cause traumatic injuries and can in some cases even be lethal. Examples of such scenario's are exploding batteries, house fires due to such explosions in combination with highly flammable interior decoration products, carcinogenic substances in products,  electrocution, small parts of products intended for young children that can easily be seperated form the product and cause suffication, poisonous products. 

Because of these dangers the European Union introduced specific EU product safety legislation. for many productgroups like toys, cosmetics, machinery, personal protective equipment, electrical products, household chemicals, gas appliances and the list goes on.

The NVWA inspects the whole distribution chain of the mentioned products. The EU product safety legislation is expanding including aspects as artificial Intelligence and becoming more complex by the day.. Complying with this legislation can therefore be a real challenge for SME on line economic operators. Especially when they deal in all kinds of categories of products.

Also the obligations for the economic operator differ substantially depending on his role in the distribution chain. An importer of a toy has far greater legal responsibilities then a mere retailer. Our own inspections and those of our EU colleague inspectorates confirm the challenges on line economic operators face when it comes to compliance. Non compliance can lead to dangerous situations but can also cause heavy financial damagesfor the economic operator. Compliance is thus crusial for all parties involved; consumers, economic. operators and market surveillance authorities like the NVWA. That is why the NVWA helps economic operators to find their way in the elaborate and complex system of EU product safety legislation by providing them with helpful and easy to apply information to improve their compliance status.