No Deforestation, No Peat, No Exploitation (NDPE) Policy

The Estée Lauder Companies’ (ELC) founding values inspire our commitment to operate responsibly and motivate us to build a sustainable business based on uncompromising ethics, integrity, fairness, diversity and trust. In partnership with our suppliers, our retailers, our consumers and everyone we touch, we aspire to foster our heritage of respect for people and the environment and be a positive influence in every community we serve.

As a buyer of raw materials globally, we recognize that the integrity of ecosystems is important to our business success. Deforestation and the conversion of natural ecosystems are drivers of global biodiversity loss and often linked to agriculture and unsustainable forestry practices. With this understanding, we aim to ensure our sourcing strategy aligns with the protection of natural forests and high conservation value ecosystems.

We consider environmental sustainability and respect for human rights to be interlinked. Our Human Rights Policy outlines our approach to respect human rights across our global operations and supply chain. We also require the suppliers we engage to commit to our Supplier Code of Conduct as a basic requirement of doing business together. The Supplier Code, which is based on internationally recognized standards, including the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and International Labor Organization’s Conventions, sets forth the basic requirements we expect of suppliers, including respect for human rights.

To further support our commitment to sourcing sustainability, ELC expects suppliers of forest-based commodities to meet the following criteria* regarding materials supplied to ELC:

No Deforestation

• No deforestation, which includes the conversion of natural forests and high conservation value forests to agriculture, tree plantations, or other land uses, or severe human-induced degradation
• The production of palm oil must not include burning, as defined by RSPO**
• Commitment to long-term protection of natural forests

No Conversion

• No conversion, which includes conversion of non-forested natural ecosystems such as peatlands to agriculture, tree plantations, or other land uses, or severe human-induced degradation
• Commitment to long-term protection and conservation of natural ecosystems

No Exploitation

• The production of forest-based commodities must follow the requirements set forth by our Supplier Code of Conduct, including our expectations for suppliers in addressing or dealing with human rights matters, including: child labor, forced labor, wages & working hours, discrimination, freedom of association, and worker health and safety
• We expect suppliers to make available grievance mechanisms for workers and affected stakeholders to report concerns, and to investigate and resolve environmental and human rights complaints using generally accepted practices and procedures.
• The production of forest-based commodities must adhere to the principle of Free, Prior, and Informed Consent to ensure protection and promotion of the rights of indigenous peoples and vulnerable communities

ELC conducts due diligence of raw material sourcing to monitor compliance with these criteria. For key forest risk commodities, we are implementing commodity-specific action plans, such as our Palm Action Plan and Timber Action Plan. We report on this process annually as appropriate.

In addition, ELC has established timebound commitments for specific commodities:

• By the end of calendar year 2025, at least 95% of our palm-based ingredients (palm oil and its derivatives) will be certified sustainable from RSPO physical supply chains.¹RSPO has established cut-off dates for deforestation or conversion as follows: Land clearing since November 2005 has not damaged primary forest or any area required to protect or enhance HCVs. Land clearing since 15 November 2018 has not damaged HCVs or HCS forests.
• We aim to use responsibly sourced paper products in our packaging whenever possible, with a goal to have 100% of our forest-based fiber cartons FSC certified by the end of calendar year 2025. FSC has established a cut-off date for deforestation or conversion of December 2020.

ELC expects that its suppliers take appropriate measures to ensure that the production of ingredients and packaging materials supplied to ELC meets the above-mentioned criteria. Our intent is to raise suppliers’ performance so they can comply with our standards. If suppliers fail to comply with the outlined raw material sourcing criteria, we will develop supplier corrective action plans and aid in implementation. If there is a lack of cooperation or untimely implementation of corrective action plans, this may result in a reduction in supplier business or termination of the supplier relationship.

To reflect ongoing best practices developing in each of our commodity supply chains, as well as our overall organization strategy, we will proactively review this policy annually and make updates as needed.

*Criteria are sourced from the Accountability Framework
**RSPO Principles & Criteria available here

¹ EXCLUDES PRODUCTS MANUFACTURED BY THIRD-PARTY MANUFACTURERS (TPMS) THAT CONTAIN PALM-BASED INGREDIENTS NOT DIRECTLY PROCURED BY THE ESTÉE LAUDER COMPANIES.

Published: May 2020
Latest Update: June 2023