CITES and the fragrance industry

Natu­ral ingre­dients remain a vital part of the fra­gran­ce palet­te. Howe­ver, some of the­se mate­rials may ori­gi­na­te from spe­cies that are vul­ne­ra­ble or threa­te­ned. CITES governs how inter­na­tio­nal tra­de in the­se spe­cies is regu­la­ted to pre­vent further harm.

To ensu­re that fra­gran­ce industry acti­vi­ties align with bio­di­ver­sity pro­tec­tion, IFRA under­took a detai­led review of the natu­ral mate­rials used by its mem­bers. This assess­ment was con­duc­ted together with a spe­cia­li­zed exter­nal con­sul­tant with exten­si­ve CITES exper­ti­se. In addi­tion, IFRA colla­bo­ra­ted with the Inter­na­tio­nal Society of Per­fu­mer Crea­tors (ISPC) to unders­tand the crea­ti­ve impor­tan­ce of the­se mate­rials in fra­gran­ce design.

The review iden­ti­fied four fra­gran­ce mate­rials that may face a heigh­te­ned risk of being sub­ject to CITES res­tric­tions in the futu­re. The­se mate­rials have been prio­ri­ti­zed within IFRA’s 2025 work pro­gram for further analy­sis. In the next pha­se, IFRA will exa­mi­ne the full supply chains of the­se mate­rials to iden­tify whe­re tar­ge­ted inter­ven­tions could redu­ce the risk of futu­re tra­de res­tric­tions, whi­le also sup­por­ting con­ser­va­tion goals.

Through this work, IFRA seeks to con­tri­bu­te both to the long-term sus­tai­na­bi­lity of fra­gran­ce crea­tion and to the pro­tec­tion of the planet’s biodiversity.