How the law ensures your cosmetics are safe

The manufacture and sale of fake and counterfeit cosmetic products is a threat to everyone’s health and well-being, and the law has an important role to play in maintaining quality standards, ensuring safety and combating fraud.
The Saudi Cosmetic Products Law applies to any product that contains one or more substances intended for use on the external parts of the human body, including the skin, hair, nails, lips, teeth and genitals, for protection, cleaning and perfuming purposes, or to change and improve the body’s appearance.
It is not permitted to import or sell cosmetic products in the Kingdom without listing them with the Saudi Food and Drug Authority (SFDA), and obtaining a certificate confirming that the products comply with the authority’s controls and conditions. The importer, manufacturer of seller undertakes that the product is safe and does not cause any harm to the health of the user under normal conditions of use according to the usage instructions, which are required by law to be displayed on the product identification label.
Factories that manufacture cosmetic products are required to apply good manufacturing practice (GMP), an international system to ensure that products are consistently produced and controlled according to quality standards appropriate to their purpose. The SFDA has the authority to ensure that these principles are followed, through inspections and other means.
Breaches of the law include deception or fraud in cosmetic products in general; selling a fraudulent, spoiled or expired cosmetic product; using incorrect information to promote the product, either on its packaging or in advertising; and using the packaging of a genuine cosmetic product with the intention to defraud.
Advertising cosmetics is also tightly controlled, and it is not permitted to advertise or promote products that have not been approved.
If the SFDA determines that a cosmetic product is not safe, is harmful to health or is not approved, it may cancel its license, order its withdrawal from the market or suspend it for a specific period. The authority may also take samples for tests, and if necessary have the products destroyed.
We all have a responsibility to ensure that the cosmetic products we use are genuine and safe, and to report anything fake, counterfeit or potentially dangerous. Consumers may check the Cosmetic Products List on theSFDA website, where complaints may also be registered.

Dimah Talal Alsharif is a Saudi legal counsel and a member of the International Association of Lawyers. Twitter: @dimah_alsharif