L’Oreal, the renowned French beauty conglomerate, has issued a public statement in response to the BBC documentary, Perfume’s Dark Secret, which revealed distressing footage of children laboring in Egyptian flower fields. The documentary traced jasmine harvested by these children to two high-end perfume brands, one of which was Lancome, a subsidiary of L’Oreal.
In their statement, L’Oreal emphasized their commitment to promptly addressing any issues within their supply chain. They revealed that their ongoing monitoring processes had already identified potential human rights violations in Egypt by October of the previous year, well before the BBC brought these concerns to light. In response, L’Oreal has implemented several concrete measures ahead of the next jasmine harvest to mitigate these issues.
L’Oreal elaborated on their proactive steps, stating, “To drive systemic change in support of local communities, in order to eliminate child labour whilst protecting the livelihood of the families who depend on jasmine picking, we have been a key player in setting up a coalition, in partnership with the Egyptian government, the fragrance houses, and other industry partners. This coalition is being led by the Fair Labor Association and the International Labour Organization, as part of their flagship ‘Harvesting the Future – Jasmine in Egypt’ project.”
Expressing disappointment, L’Oreal noted, “We are very disappointed that the BBC chose not to include our concrete actions in Egypt, which we had already started to implement before they first contacted us and which we have actively shared with them in detail.”
