KEY POINTS:
The natural beauty industry is booming worldwide and New Zealand, with its clean green image, is perfectly poised to capitalise.
But is natural beauty really a green proposition, or merely a marketing tool?
The answer can be found in an alarming statistic. It is thought that women ingest as much as 2kg of chemicals a year from the cosmetics and skincare they use - and there are no rules or regulations governing their ingredients.
Attention has particularly been drawn to the use of parabens as perservatives in beauty products, which some studies have linked to cancer, and phthalates, the industrial chemicals used in many cosmetic products and linked to birth defects.
As concern grows about the use of chemicals in beauty products, the natural beauty industry is becoming mainstream.
World-wide, the industry is worth US$5.9 billion ($7.7 billion), or 2 per cent of the total beauty market, and is growing at 17 per cent a year.
Large international companies, such as L'Oreal, Clarins and YSL are buying or creating new companies to take part in the revolution.
Leigh Kite, of Comvita's manuka honey-based skincare range Huni, recently attended the second Natural Beauty Summit in New York, which attracted 250 skincare companies from around the world.
The focus was on defining what "natural beauty" is, said Mrs Kite, and working towards establishing global standards.
"We don't want to sully the natural beauty segment with brands that are greenwashing. Using one organic ingredient and calling a product organic is not being responsible or ethical - we need to be transparent and honest with consumers."
"There are already 20 different standards being used globally, and as an industry we want harmonisation."
Catherine de Groot of Wellington natural skincare company Trilogy said she felt sorry for customers who were increasingly being bombarded with dubious advertising claims.
"It's often impossible for the lay person to cut through all the advertising hype. The key is for consumers to ask questions ... "
Mrs de Groot said people increasingly wanted to know where the natural ingredients come from.
"They want traceability in the supply chain, they want to know if the products are fairtrade ... customers are becoming more savvy," she said.
"We try to make every step of the supply train transparent. We know where every ingredient comes from, we know every component of the packaging and how it can be recycled."
Trilogy has been honoured as the only New Zealand company to be included in the first Green Beauty Bible, a book put out by the British beauty writers responsible for the popular Beauty Bible.
Mrs Kite and Mrs de Groot agreed that things were getting tougher for rogue brands purporting to be green.
"At the end of the day regulations are becoming tighter," says Mrs de Groot.
WHAT SHOULD I LOOK FOR?
* Products that use low or minimal amounts of synthetic chemicals
* Natural, organic or fair trade ingredients
* Ingredients from renewable or sustainable sources
* Minimal packaging and recycled or recyclable packaging
WHAT SHOULD I AVOID?
* Parabens, petrochemicals, formaldehyde, sodium lauryl sulphate chemicals, mineral oils and aluminium
