A commitment to defending Human Rights and being Human-Kind

Ambitious. Yes. Impossible. No. Our Commitment to Life roadmap, which we launched last June, sets out our bold targets for the next decade to step up our actions and tackle some of the world's most pressing issues across three key pillars. Amongst our priorities is a commitment to defend human rights and be human-kind by creating better, kinder, and more inclusive conditions. This includes ensuring gender parity and equal pay by 2023, as well as adopting a living wage for all our employees. We also vowed to address inequality for underrepresented groups across our network.

Natura &Co represents four unique beauty brands: Avon, Natura, The Body Shop, and Aesop – a group of companies united by a shared purpose and commitment to become the best beauty brand FOR the world through sustainable and ethical business practices.

When we launched our Commitment to Life 2030 sustainability vision, we knew that meeting each target was something we could not do alone. We are confident we will get there, but only through working together with our partners, competitors, other companies, and NGOs, will we find solutions to tackle some of the targets highlighted within our Commitment To Life goals.

Featuring a panel of incredible guest speakers, including many from across our four brands, on June 22nd 2021, we held a LIVE virtual event: Commitment To Life: One Year On across all of our social platforms. The event was a chance for each speaker to update attendees on the progress and results we have made to date and an insight into some of the challenges we have faced as a group. 

Our diversity and inclusion session was introduced at the event by Paula Fallowfield, Chief HR Officer at Natura &Co. Speaking on gender, Paula shared insights into our equitable pay journey and our efforts towards our two goals within this area – closing the gender pay gap and increasing the gender balance across our leadership and board to 50% by 2023.

Paula also discussed our work with global HR consultancy Mercer and our results from a comprehensive, in-depth study of our position on equitable pay and gender balance across 73 markets. She shared our findings which revealed that at 13%, our raw gap is at the lower end of industry norms, and our unexplained gap – that which legitimate factors cannot explain – is at 0.9%.

She stressed that while experts tell us that these numbers are low by industry standards, for Natura &Co, any unexplained gap is unacceptable and that "we're going to make an effort to close that this year".

Of course, gender is only one part of inclusion and diversity. Within this pillar and as part of our Commitment To Life goals, we vowed to increase inclusion for under-represented groups by 30%, including sexual diversity, gender identity, the socio-economically disadvantaged, and the physically and mentally disabled.

Speaking on this at the event, Jade Fraser, Head of Diversity, Inclusion & Engagement Natura &Co said:

"Through our Commitment to Life, we endeavour to raise the baseline for inclusion, diversity and belonging not only within our industry but across the world. Our plan is to create a workforce reflective of the societies in which they operate." 

It is no secret that women, especially those from marginalised communities, have been disproportionately affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. Global expert and CEO & Executive Director UN Global Compact, at the event, Sanda Ojiambo stressed the impact this has had on the pay gap:

"The COVID-19 crisis has made the economic gender gap even wider, threatening to slow or reverse any progress we have made. And yet, embracing diversity and inclusion has proven to be not only the right thing to do but also the smart thing to do." 

Sanda shared valuable insights for business leaders on how companies can become more inclusive and some of the best practices that will be helpful to the business community. She mentioned findings on an initiative called Target Gender Equality for which Natura &Co is proud to be a patron. This project is an accelerator programme that helps participating companies put the UN Global Compact Women's Empowerment Principles into action by setting and meeting ambitious targets for women's representation and leadership in business:

"More than 300 businesses took part in round one of the Target Gender Equality programmes. 83% of them are creating new targets or revising existing targets on women's representation in top management and leadership."

Sanda rounded up this section by saying, "When women and other underrepresented groups are empowered, everybody wins." 

We couldn't agree more, which is why defending Human Rights and being Human-Kind is key to our #CommitmentToLife.

Watch the full event here.