The Consumer Product Safety Commission has extended its stay of enforcement on lead content testing in products aimed at children through the end of the year. Beginning on December 31st, 2011, children’s products must be tested and certified by a CPSC-approved third-party laboratory to be sold in the United States. This is the third extension of this deadline and Chairman Tenenbaum noted this would be the “final” extension.

However, despite this stay, manufacturers, importers and retailers of children's products must continue to comply with existing federal restrictions for total lead content. Current federal law requires that all children's products have no more than 300 parts per million (ppm) of lead content. That lead content limit will drop to 100 ppm on August 14, 2011, unless the Consumer Product Safety Commission determines that it is not technologically feasible to establish this lower limit for a particular product or product category.