US retail giant Wal-Mart Stores Inc has taken several brands of baby clothes off its shelves in China. Wal-Mart stores in Guangdong Province were selling nine Chinese brands of baby clothes that contained a dye that could decompose into toxic aromatic amine compounds. One of Wal-Mart's Beijing stores was also selling some of the brands. Wal-Mart acknowledged that baby clothes containing the harmful dye were sold at those shops and said the company had suspended selling them while an investigation took place.
The Beijing News reported that nearly half of all baby clothes in southern China examined during a three-month spot check failed to meet safety standards and 10 percent contained a cancer-causing dye. Overall, 49.4 percent of baby clothes checked failed to meet safety requirements and had unacceptable levels of formaldehyde, improper PH levels or inaccurate labels.