European SCS to tackle green formulations and packaging

27-Jun-2013 - Last updated on 28-Jun-2013 at 10:17 GMT

Organisers, Organic Monitor has made green formulations and sustainable packaging focal themes at the next edition of its European Sustainable Cosmetics Summit, in a bid to cater to the growing pressure placed on the industry to reduce its carbon footprint.

Hosted in Paris on the on 21-23rd October, the three day event will showcase industry best-practices and highlight improvement areas as pressure grows to adopt green formulations and reduce packaging impacts due to rising raw material costs and waste management issues.

According to the market analyst, new and emerging materials will be highlighted for major ingredient classes such as preservatives, fragrances, emulsifiers and surfactants and the use of novel materials like bamboo, wood and hybrid polymers in cosmetic packaging as well as the technical issues of using green ingredients vis-à-vis conventional ingredients will also be addressed.

Developments in sustainable extraction methods and processing techniques are also on the summit agenda while a workshop will for the first time, focus on the safety assessment of botanical ingredients.

“Although many cosmetic and ingredient companies are turning to natural sources, questions remain of the safety of such materials.”

Dynamic industry experts to deliver talks

The organisers have got Chris Kilham, also known as the Medicine Hunter on board to kick off the 2013 edition with a keynote on ‘Innovating from Nature’. The renowned author and educator will look at how the wealth of knowledge present in the plant kingdom can be a source of innovation in the cosmetics industry.

In another paper Kilham is also set to highlight some of the botanical actives that are making headway in cosmetics applications while elsewhere an update on sustainability metrics will also be given by other industry experts where apart from the use of Life-Cycle Analysis to measure environmental impacts, methods of measuring carbon and water footprints will be discussed.

Over the course of the Summit Jean-Florent Campion from L’Oreal will also have the opportunity to share his company’s experiences in measuring the water footprint of cosmetic products. Another paper will be delivered by boho Cosmetics and Naobay who will highlight the challenges of developing novel packaging solutions.

For more information on the programme, please see here.