BRIEF was commissioned by the Centre for WTO Studies (CWS), Indian Institute of Foreign Trade, to conduct the Impact Assessment of the Quality Control Order (2021) on Toys, a study examining the effects of the Toys Quality Control Order (QCO) issued by the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT). The study assesses how mandatory BIS certification under the QCO has affected the quality and safety of toys manufactured, imported, and sold in India, along with its wider implications for the toy ecosystem – evaluating both the regulatory benefits and the compliance burden borne by industry. Findings from the study are to be submitted to the Department of Commerce, Government of India.

BRIEF designed and executed a nationwide, multi-stakeholder field survey spanning four regions and India’s principal toy-manufacturing and trading clusters: the North (Delhi-NCR, including the Greater Noida Toy City, and Rajasthan’s soft-toy and traditional-toy clusters), the South (Tamil Nadu, centred on Chennai with cluster coverage in Madurai and Thanjavur), the East (West Bengal, including the Natungram wooden-toy cluster and the Salt Lake Light Engineering Park), and the West (Maharashtra – India’s largest toy-exporting state – covering Nashik, Solapur, and the Mumbai-Thane belt). Region selection was grounded in the location of manufacturing hubs, GI-tagged traditional-toy clusters, and trade concentrations, with fieldwork sequenced across the manufacturing and retail calendar and routed to named manufacturers, trading firms, and industry associations in each cluster.

The assessment captured the perspectives of the full range of stakeholders touched by the QCO, gathering primary data through a prescribed instrument from consumers, manufacturers, trading firms, retailers, testing laboratories, policy experts, and health experts, supported by engagement with toy-industry associations and state industrial development corporations. By structuring the sample to weight each region toward its dominant role – manufacturing, trade, or traditional production – BRIEF was able to surface how the certification regime has played out differently for domestic manufacturers, importers, traders, procurement agencies, and end-consumers. The resulting evidence base equips CWS and the Department of Commerce to evaluate the QCO’s impact on product quality and safety, identify compliance challenges across the value chain, and inform future refinements to India’s toy product-certification framework.