IFRA 46th Amendment is Out

The International Fragrance Association (IFRA) has officially issued the 46^th Amendment to the IFRA Code of Practice as part of the industry's ongoing safety program*.
There are six new restrictive Standards based on the Quantitative Risk Assessment (QRA)** and one new Standard prohibiting the use of 2,4-Octadienal.
IFRA has also withdrawn the Standard for Vanillin, which was first put in place with the 44^th Amendment. This Standard was put on hold on 1^st December, 2009, has now been officially withdrawn. Following the Vanillin Standard's notification additional information was submitted, which allowed for a re-evaluation of the material. After further additional testing and a critical evaluation of all available data today, IFRA has decided to withdraw the Standard and not set a revised Standard.
IFRA has also updated various guidance documents as part of the 46^th Amendment.

• QRA Information Booklet Version 6.0 Final 2011 (including guidance on classes for IFRA Certificates)
• Annex 1 to the IFRA Standards which has been updated with contributions from other sources for o-Methoxycinnamaldehyde and Safranal
• Index (list of all IFRA Standards)
• Standard Operating Procedures (SOP) for the implementation of IFRA Standards

All the new Standards and related guidance documents are freely available on the IFRA website: http://www.ifraorg.org
1.    Six new Standards, based on the QRA

CAS             Name                                      Status
                                                            
    7492-44-6     alpha-Butylcinnamaldehyde                   
    39189-74-7    2-Heptylidene cyclopentan-1-one                  NEW
    1504-74-1     o-Methoxycinnamaldehyde                       RESTRICTED
    68922-13-4    3-Methyl-2-(pentyloxy)cyclopent-2-en-1-one      (QRA)
    13257-44-8    2-Nonyn-1-al dimethyl acetal
    13144-88-2    1-(2,4,4,5,5-Pentamethyl-1-cyclopenten-1-yl)
                  ethan-1-one

2.    One new Standard prohibiting the use of 2,4-Octadienal

2,4-Octadienal has been reviewed by the RIFM Expert Panel and, due to lack of adequate data (Dermal DNA Adduct study), it was concluded that it should not be used as or in fragrance ingredients in whatever application until additional data is available and considered sufficient to support its use. The presence of a structural alert as defined in the Human Health Criteria Document justifies this ban which already concerns several materials of the same structural family.

CAS           Name                     Status

    30361-28-5    2,4-Octadienal            PROHIBITED

How the whole thing works, for those who missed our previous posts on the subject of perfumery ingredients restrictions:
The fragrance industry's safety program is founded on testing fragrance materials and either establishing 'Safe Use Levels', or prohibiting their use, based on studying their potential effects on people and the environment. Currently the safety program contains 186 'Standards', which restrict, or prohibit, the use of selected fragrance materials.
To ensure that the fragrance industry adheres to its safety standards the International Fragrance
Association (IFRA) has a Compliance Program. Every year 50 products from a selection of 450, gathered from stores in 10 different countries, are tested. If a product does not comply with its Code of Practice and Standards, IFRA works with the manufacturer to ensure compliance.
The IFRA Code of Practice is a comprehensive document that supports the IFRA commitment to provide products that are safe for use by the consumer and to the environment.
The Code of Practice applies to the manufacture and handling of all fragrance materials, for all types of applications and contains the full set of IFRA Standards. Abiding by the IFRA Code of Practice is a prerequisite for all fragrance supplier companies that are members of IFRA (either directly or through national associations). The majority of client companies (including producers of toiletries and household products) expect their fragrances to comply with IFRA Standards as set out in the Code.
The IFRA Code of Practice is distributed worldwide and is in the hands of all member associations and their member companies, in addition to governmental regulatory bodies and many other stakeholders. It is also available to all on our website: http://www.ifraorg.org

**Quantitative Risk Assessment (QRA)

In 2005 IFRA introduced a new Quantitative Risk Assessment or QRA approach to restrict fragrance materials that have a potential to induce contact sensitization. This new approach is a much more refined approach for evaluating sensitizing materials, and so provides more precise guidance on use levels of materials depending on the situation and the product in which they are used; ultimately it should better protect the consumer from becoming sensitized to a specific material.

SOURCE: The International Fragrance Association (IFRA), Brussels 27th June 2011

Continuing the saga: *what* future of perfumery???

I planned on writing up something about how the future of perfumery looks very grim indeed after so much arbitrary action has been taken to limit and restrict creativity for anyone concerned.

You might remember that it started long ago with oakmoss, a natural sunstance of which there is no equivalent synthetic to substitute, rendering a whole olfactory family, that of the chypres, obsolete and wimpering at its last throes of vintage life. After the loss of those vintages, nothing more...This had prompted me to write a lament for Mitsouko the brave. Maybe I was just being my usual passionate self.
But then the issue escalated and then escalated some more.
This has taken such a toll that even Chanel is issuing things in Les Exclusives line (more of which in review form later on) that smell nothing like chypre, yet they are being touted as being the best chypre in 30 years.
I don't know...I might be cynical. But is this what we are reduced to?

So today I came across this excellent article by Tony Burfield who is co-founder of Cropwatch ( a body who does some 'opposition' work for that 40th amendement IFRA of which I have talked about) and I think it's very worth reading.
Please do so here.
It seems as though we are being conditioned to believe that things are not what we see them plainly to be. A Magritte come alive.

I would be very interested in your comments.

Artwork by Rene Magritte "Ceci n'est pas une pipe" (=this is not a pipe) courtesy of allposters.com

It's the end of the world as we know it (perfume ingredients banned)

The above line from a well-known REM song unfortunately does not leave me feeling fine, like the song repeated time after time again in its refrain. Maybe it has to do with my abhorrence for state intervention of any kind in what I perceive as my consumer’s choice. Maybe it has to do with the prospect of endangered aromas, in the manner of endangered species that is looming in the horizon very shortly. Or maybe, just maybe, I am one of those who safe in their well-arranged existence likes to live precariously through the sensual pleasures that are given us, who knows for how much longer: a vivere pericolosamente mentality of eating medium-rare bovine steak, listening to alternative underground bordering on satanistic some would argue rock with covers that might bruise sensitive feministic sensibilities and -last but not least- using perfumes containing real oakmoss in amounts exceeding the prescribed percentage set by IFRA (the International Fragrance Association) and the EU (European Union).

In view of the whole debacle of oakmoss use as stated in a previous article, I was just about to resign myself to searching for vintage bottles of my favourite chypre perfumes such as Mitsouko, Femme, Bandit and Chanel#19. Not an easy task all the same, as perfume unlike wine does not come with a production year, despite the fact that we perfume-users use the oenological term vintage so often to convey a particularly good aged masterpiece. But it seems oakmoss were to be the least of our troubles.
As Anya McCoy, a talented natural perfumer whom I have interviewed in the past in this venue and the president of the Natural Perfumers Guild, brought to my attention, there is a whole list of ingredients that are about to be eradicated or strictly controlled in the formulae of perfumes produced from now on. The control of the percentage of certain natural ingredients to minute amounts in a given formula might bear no great value in the creation of a new perfume, as it could fuel the imagination of a given nose into composing new wilder arpeggios of unprecedented combinations. It would certainly signify however the destruction and bastardization of several revered masterpieces of the past, rendering them but ghosts of their former glorious shelves leaving a generation that has never smelled the originals with a skewed perception of what greatness really is all about in the olfactory kingdom.

The alphabetical catalogue of those nature-derived aromatics that are restricted follows:
Angelica root oil
Bergamot oil expressed
Bitter Orange Peel Oil Expressed
Cade oil
Cedar moss
Chenopodium oil
Citrus oils and other furocoumarins containing essential oils
Costus root oil, absolute and concrete
Cumin oil
Fig leaf absolute
Grapefruit oil expressed
Lavender
Lemon oil cold pressed
Lime oil expressed
Massoia bark oil
Massoia lactone
Melissa oil (genuine Melissa officinalis)
Oak moss extracts
Opoponax
Peru balsam
Petitgrain Mandarin Oil
Rose oil
Santolina oil
Savin oil
Styrax
Tagetes oil and absolute
Tea leaf absolute
Tree moss extracts
Verbena absolute
Verbena oil

Perusing the list one cannot but drop one’s jaw. Lavender? The quintessential essential oil that is recommended for pacifying even babies? Citrus, bergamot and bitter orange peel oils? Seriously, do they know that here in the Mediterranean we make a dessert out of the inedible bergamot fruit, using exactly the peel of the fruit boiled in syrup made with sugar? We eat the stuff for heaven’s sake. How much more harm could it do if we applied it on our skins? Yes, I am aware that those oils are photosensitizing. Surely a warning label on the box on not wearing it on exposed body parts could serve the purpose of protecting us amply? Not to mention rose oil (whose petals we also use in a dessert….the way I am going you must have formed the impression there’s precious few things we don’t make into desserts….well, it’s true, not counting the IFRA executives in those numbers….)

But the whole scenario would not bring doom futuristic Blade Runner echoes in our ears had it been chosen to just use warning labels on the boxes, stating exactly what the dangers are, so that the consumer can make an informed choice and suffer what consequences he/she has brought upon him/herself through that choice. Much like smoking…..
To cut a long story short, this whole dirty business smells more of money and lost revenues for the companies who produce aroma-chemicals and the law-firms that defend cases of demented “victims” of allegedly dangerous perfumes, than real flower and fruit oils.
It reminds me of the notorious case of an electronic goods company who lost a fortune to someone who was sick enough to microwave his cat and then plead his case in court successfully stating the instructions never warned about not putting an animal in the microwave appliance in the first place…I mean, geez…

If you want to make a difference and want to be vocal on the subject, there is a petition issued by Cropwatch, an independent watchdog for natural ingredients used in perfumery; you can vote against the 40th Amendment of IFRA that restricts those ingredients and make them come into discussion about this practice.
You can do it here



Pic of Tim Burton's "Corpse bride" comes from athinorama.