In order to assist enterprises in improving product quality and promoting export trade, technicians from Jiangsu Light Industry Products and Children's Products Testing Center have recently used gas chromatography-mass spectrometry to successfully develop detection technologies for TCEP, TCPP, TDCP, and formamide in toy materials. The detection limits for TCEP, TCPP, and TDCP can reach 0.1 mg/kg, and for formamide can reach 1 mg/kg. The detection limits meet the requirements of the European Union for these harmful substances, which can meet the detection needs of enterprises and ensure product quality for China's toy exports.

TCEP is a phosphate ester that can be used as a flame retardant for polymers. TCEP belongs to carcinogenic and reproductive toxic substances. Under the sucking and chewing effects of children, TCEP is prone to migrate out of toys, and ingestion of TCEP can cause kidney, liver, and brain damage and trigger cancer. TCPP and TDCP are both halogenated substitutes for TCEP, with similar physicochemical and toxicological properties to TCEP, and therefore subject to the same control measures. The limit for these three flame retardants is 5 milligrams per kilogram.

The European Commission's requirement for formaldehyde in foam toy materials is that the formaldehyde emission limit is 20 micrograms per cubic meter after passing a maximum of 28 days of emission testing. When the formamide content in foam material does not exceed 200 mg/kg, emission test is not necessary. The foam material contains formamide residue, which is due to the addition of a foaming agent called azodicarbonamide in the production process, and the product is called foaming agent AC or foaming agent ADC. This substance will decompose and produce gases such as nitrogen and carbon dioxide during the heating process of production, thereby causing the plastic to produce a foaming effect. In this decomposition process, part of formamide will also be produced and left in foam.