Symrise Joins “No Animal Testing” EU Project

Flavor and fragrance ingredients supplier Symrise (Holzminden, Germany) says it has joined an EU project dedicated to finding alternative testing methods to animal testing. Symrise says it is the first company in the fragrance and flavor industry to join the European Partnership for Alternative Approaches to Animal Testing (EPAA).

EPAA is a collaboration between the European Commission, European trade associations, and companies from various industries. Members promote the use of alternative testing methods to animal testing and contribute to the development and implementation of new alternative approaches, as well as share practices and expertise.

“The goal is to reduce the number of animals used for testing purposes to the absolute minimum and completely end the practice at some point,” Symrise stated in a press release.

The company says it already performs advanced analysis using alternative testing methods, including the Ceetox method for skin sensitization and the Gentronix Green and Blue Screen analyses. Another method, the CuTech model for skin sensitization, was developed jointly by CuTech and Symrise, both of which received a European patent for the innovative ex vivo skin model last year.

“By pooling the available resources, everyone involved benefits, and this will hopefully result in better, more quickly available and widely accepted alternative methods,” said Boris Müller, PhD, Symrise’s vice president, global product compliance, on the EPAA project.