FIGHTING TO EMPOWER WOMEN AND GIRLS

In 2003 we launched Stop Violence in the Home, built on almost a decade of campaigning on the issue. Our goal was to raise awareness and funds to support local partners helping those affected by domestic violence, including child survivors, as well as lobbying governments to enact legislation.

We launched the Stop Trafficking of Children & Young People campaign with ECPAT International in 2009. It inspired change on an unprecedented scale, gathering over 7 million signatures from customers globally and leading to 24 countries across the world committing to adopting new legislation.

Our shea is handcrafted by women in Ghana, where the techniques have been handed down for generations. Our Community Fair Trade partnership ensures the women receive a fair price and benefits for their work, however, lots of shea is still exported from Ghana with little benefit to the women who produce it. In 2011 we brought industry stakeholders together to form the Global Shea Alliance. The key objectives are to improve shea production, grow the market and to drive greater benefit to the women at the bottom of the supply chain. The Sustainability Principles establish how shea collectors, processors, exporters and the brands that use shea should operate if they want to claim their supply chains are sustainable.

In 2019, we encouraged girls to dream big. In partnership with Plan International, we worked to give women and girls in Indonesia and Brazil the tools they need to succeed and unlock their dreams. Sadly, lots of girls in these countries don’t have access to education and employment. Our Dream Big campaign supported an 18-month programme that provided young women with vocational training and skills to help them start their own businesses or find good, safe employment. We’ve been helping 1,500 young women through this programme.
 

Period products should not be a luxury, but many people who have periods aren’t able to afford them. In 2019 we teamed up with Bloody Good Period, a charitable project that provides menstrual supplies to asylum seekers, refugees and those living in poverty. Gabby Edlin founded Bloody Good Period when she realised that food banks and drop-in centres weren’t supplying enough period products to people who needed them, or couldn’t supply any at all. We used our thousands of stores and The Body Shop at Home™ network to collect period products for those in need, donating them to local organisations like refuges, drop-in centres and shelters.

In 2019 we partnered with Plastics for Change to forge a new Community Fair Trade partnership, purchasing recycled plastic from Bengaluru, India. Plastics for Change work with ‘waste pickers’ in India who are often ‘dalits’ – the lowest members of India’s caste system, and vulnerable to discrimination and poor working conditions. They’ve helped women like Annamma, who was a waste picker since she was a child and now manages a Dry Waste Collection Centre, employing a number of people and supporting her daughter through a plastic engineering course.

During the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, many countries reported a sharp and shocking rise in domestic violence. With much of the world in lockdown, many women, men and children were trapped at home with their abusers and isolated from their friends and family. With our Natura &Co sister brands (Natura and AVON) we launched our #IsolatedNotAlone campaign, working with global domestic violence charity NO MORE to keep the issues front of mint for governments, and offer essential guidance to those in need and anyone who may know someone in need.