Chapter 5 - Manufacturing Cosmetic Ingredients according to Good Manufacturing Practice Principles

Abstract

Listen

Translate article

In the early part of this decade, the European Commission signaled that it would seek to define a good manufacturing practice (GMP) for the manufacture of cosmetics. Although GMP was already a requirement in the Cosmetics Directive 76/768/EEC and its amendments, there was actually no definition of what that good manufacturing practice should be. Following petitioning from industry, the commission ceased work on its own document and signaled it would make reference to the new ISO standard for GMP for cosmetic manufacturing (IS0 22716), which was published in November 2007. The European Federation for Cosmetic Ingredients (EFfCI) took the initiative to define a GMP for ingredients to avoid application of the GMP for final cosmetic products and IS0 227 I6 drafts to the manufacture of cosmetic ingredients as well. Potentially this could have resulted in inappropriate controls and unreasonable costs being imposed on the cosmetic ingredient suppliers. This chapter explains why it was necessary to separately define a GMP recommendation for cosmetic ingredients, rather than accepting the GMP, which has been defined for cosmetics or pharmaceutical starting materials and gives a brief overview of the key features of the EFfCI guide. The emphasis in the guide is for cosmetic suppliers to concentrate on implementing the key GMP principles during the manufacture and supply of these ingredients. The successful implementation of the EFfCI GMP Guide will not prevent cosmetic manufacturers from placing other requirements on their suppliers, such as the audits hinted at in ISO 22716:2007. But at least once auditors arrive, they should observe a facility which is making cosmetic products that are safe and fit for their purpose.