Responsibly sourcing “green gold”
Prized for its use in Earl Grey tea, medicine and perfume, we spotlight bergamot, the fruit of the Greek goddess Aphrodite, and its journey from Calabria, Italy to our new anti-stress fragrance supplement FOREST LUNGS.
We are committed to ensuring that all the raw materials in FOREST LUNGS, our new anti-stress fragrance supplement, are produced in a way that respects people and the environment. Two main sub-segments of their sourcing for shared value program focus on responsible sourcing and sourcing communities.
Bergamot, the sour citrus fruit whose aromatic skin delivers its essential oil comes almost exclusively from Calabria, southern Italy, where our fragrance house is working with local producers to ensure responsible sourcing of this natural ingredient. The locals sometimes refer to bergamot as ‘green gold’, and it’s famed for its essential oil that has been used in hundreds of flavour and fragrance applications for centuries, from Earl Grey tea to personal care products and fine fragrances. Ninety per-cent of the world’s production of bergamot oil is sourced from crop to factory in Calabria.
It takes four to five years for a bergamot tree to bear fruit, with each tree producing around 100 kilograms per year, and two trees to produce a single kilogram of essential oil. Bergamot production complies with the principles of organic farming and two of our fragrance house’s three main suppliers are members of the Union for Ethical BioTrade (UEBT) which sets high sustainability standards.
Since 2017, as part of their Responsible Sourcing Programme, our fragrance house has been conducting audits of its main direct suppliers and assessments of this complex supply chain. Behind the scenes of Calabria’s exceptional history and scenery, around 1,300 smallholder farmers work on the bergamot trees. They pick the fruit and sell it to small processing companies, cooperatives and producers who transform the peel into essential oil according to strict standards for quality.
Our fragrance house's sourcing teams work with third-party auditors often trained as agronomists to conduct field visits across the bergamot supply chain. In close collaboration and with the active support of our direct suppliers, improvement plans are implemented to share best practices and close any gaps in agricultural and farm management practices against the Responsible Sourcing Policy. The target is to ensure that 90% of raw materials volume of natural origin is responsibly sourced by 2020, and the remaining volume by 2030.
Pre-order FOREST LUNGS now.