Risk Management of Citronella Oil Repellent Products

Abstract

According to the re-classification of regulatory control of citronella oil repellent products from hazardous substance type 2 to hazardous substance type 1 in 2012, it was found that the entrepreneurs are more interested in producing and importing these products. Due to the fact that the simple process of the notification of hazardous substance type 1 is faster and requires fewer documents than those in the registration of hazardous substance type 2 and the consumers prefer to use citronella oil repellent products, the distribution of the products in the market rapidly increases and is more various. In the fiscal year of 2015-2016, there were 6 products had been complained and requested to evaluate for their repellency effects against insects or mosquitoes. Regarding the test results of the efficacy effects of these six products, all of them failed to meet the efficacy criteria. Therefore, consumers were at risk to receive the ineffective products. It was noted that the efficacy reports were not required in the notification process of hazardous substance type 1. In consequence, this study proposed to revise the regulatory control measures of citronella oil repellent products and to identify risks in the current control measures including the risk from the products. The methodology in this study was divided into 2 parts which were qualitative research by collecting data and information the secondary data source and quantitative research using purposive sampling to randomly select the labels on the products placing on the market during April 1-30, 2017. According to the study results, it was found that, from the inspection of 24 product labels, only 2 products carried correct and complete labeling information required by law and 6 products carried no exaggerated claims on the labels. Among the products found to carry over-claims labels, over-claims of product safety and efficacy were found most, which were 11 products.  Outcome, this study proposed 4 control measures for risk management of citronella oil repellent products, which were compliance measures, inspection and surveillance measures, enforcement measures,  and risk communication measures.