Kazuma replies: Meerkat 50 just a "toy ATV"

Last week, the Consumer Product Safety Commission issued an unusually strong warning about an all-terrain vehicle designed for children as young as six. The agency said the Kazuma Meerkat 50 put children at risk of injury or death because of multiple safety defects, including no front brakes, no parking brake and the ability to start the ATV in gear. (As we reported, the CPSC issued a warning, rather than a recall; the agency is currently without a quorum and thus unable to issue recalls without manufacturer consent.) 

At the time we wrote about the Kazuma Meerkat, we had not heard from the company that imports these vehicles, Kazuma Pacfic Inc. But now we have, in an email from company president Jason Tsai. His key claims: 

• The Meerkat 50 has been selling in the U.S. since 2000 and the company has not received any accident claims due to front brake, parking brake or gear indicator issues. 
• Tsai claims that CPSC officials told him the Meerkat 50 violated ANSI/SVIA-1-2001, a voluntary industry standard for ATVs, which, among other things, requires vehicles to have parking brakes. According to Tsai, the standard only applies to ATVs with engines more powerful than 70cc, which would exempt the 48cc Meerkat. The Meerkat 50 is really "a toy for kids to play on," not a real ATV, Tsai says. (Last year, however, the Specialty Vehicle Industry Association, the trade group that co-authored ANSI/SVIA-1-2001, referred to the Meerkat 50 and three other "new to the U.S." models as not being compliant with the standard, and posing a "serious safety risk to consumers.") 
• The ATV safety problem today is "overpowering," says, Tsai, with hundreds of deaths and thousands of injuries every year, by "killer machines" that all have front brakes, parking brakes and gear indicators. A large part of the problem, Tsai says, lies with the high performance engines — 200cc or bigger — that "make drivers feel like Superman." According to Tsai, Kazuma Pacific's adult-size ATVs are "low performance" models more suitable to agricultural use than high-speed sports. Tsai believes the CPSC should require a license for any adult who wants to drive an ATV with a 200cc-or-bigger engine and appropriate training should be given first. 
• According to Tsai, at the time the CPSC contacted him last December, Kazuma's factory in China was already in the process of retooling to produce a new version of the Meerkat 50 that would address the agency's concerns. That new model, Tsai says, is now ready for export. (See image above, provided by Tsai.)

On learning of Tsai's email, CPSC spokeswoman Julie Vallese said the agency's press release "speaks for itself." Companies are always given an opportunity to review any release before it is issued and that procedure was followed in Kazuma's case as well, with ample time for the company to comment, Vallese added. 

We agree with Tsai that the government should also be more aggressive about safety issues that affect full-size ATVs, and we're encouraged by his statement that his company's new models address the CPSC's concerns. However, we stand by our assertion that ATVs made for children are dangerous products, and not "toy ATVs," as Tsai claims. The Meerkat 50 can reach a top speed of 20 miles per hour; six-year-old children should not be in control of a vehicle at that speed under any circumstances. 

Previously: 

• The CPSC's ATV non-recall: A dangerous precedent for a hamstrung agency 
• New data on ATVs: As dangerous as ever 
• On the path to safer ATVs 
• CPSC entering legal limbo; agency can still do recalls