Botanicals

Is it worthwhile to look for natural ingredients in skin-care products? Leaving aside the fact that the process of removing a plant extract and then stabilizing and preserving it in a cosmetic renders it fairly unnatural, the answer is yes and no. There are bountiful numbers of wonderful plants and plant extracts that have beneficial effects on skin—and there are plenty of plant extracts that present problems for skin, too. Even so, let's say a natural or botanical ingredient is effective as a disinfectant; that doesn't make it better than a synthetically derived disinfectant, it just makes it an alternative. One shortcoming of natural ingredients in skin-care products that the cosmetics industry hasn't addressed is that each natural ingredient has a large range of limitations. These include what happens as a result of the purification process it goes through to get into a product, which part of the plant is effective, bad crops, possible contamination with herbicides, and maintaining consistent concentrations. In many ways synthetic ingredients are often more reliable for the skin.

It is also important to reiterate that just because an ingredient is found growing in nature doesn't mean it's good for the skin. Lots of plants are poisonous if ingested and lots of plants can irritate the skin.

Among the reasons to be wary of natural ingredients (aside from the lack of a regulated definition of the word "natural") is that their manufacturers do not make their research available to the Cosmetic Ingredient Review (CIR) panel of the Cosmetic, Toiletry, and Fragrance Association (CTFA). This association is the cosmetics industry's attempt at self-regulation. The efforts of this group are interesting, even though the cosmetics industry doesn't always cooperate. According to an article in Drug & Cosmetics Industry magazine (June 1997, page 89), CIR panel members were "frustrated by a lack of specific information to allow them to characterize [natural] ingredients in a manner specific enough to determine safety [or benefit]." The panel further noted "botanicals are frequently poorly defined, subject to seasonal variations or variations due to different species sources, and varying extraction procedures." Specifically, what is lacking is sufficient information regarding composition, usage concentrations, and possible contaminants, which raises serious doubts about the safety of botanicals and their use.

While plants sound great, pure and natural and all that, and while sesame oil and licorice extract sound far better than capric/caprylic triglyceride and glycyrrhetinic acid, they aren't better or worse. Each has its pros and cons, and it would be a delusion to assume otherwise.