Natural skin care 'has massive benefit over synthetic'
Much has been made in recent years about using natural and organic products, with more and more consumers looking for simple, pure skin care.
However, there can be some confusion about what it means for a cream or other item to be natural as opposed to organic, according to an expert.
Simon Golding, biochemical engineer and founder of mypure.co.uk, explains: "I think a lot of people are going to be confused when they're thinking about organic cosmetics, because they always think about it in food terms rather than cosmetic terms."
When it comes to groceries, buying organic is often more beneficial, however this is not necessarily the case for cosmetics, he says.
Natural skin care products are much better for the body than artificial cosmetics, but the upgrade from natural to organic skin care items is not necessarily much more advantageous, Mr Golding reveals.
"There is a huge jump between synethetic and natural ingredients - you get a massive health benefit by switching between the two. And then when you go a step further with the certified organic natural ingredients there's very little difference in the health benefit," he says.
"The problem is consumers look at the product and say 'its got to be certified organic' or otherwise its no good, whereas actually you're getting 99 per cent of the benefit by just switching to a natural product and you're only getting a tiny extra benefit by going to an organic product," Mr Golding continues.
He explains that the reason for this is that organic creams do not contain as many beneficial ingredients because they are simply not allowed due to regulations governing certification.
For example, hyaluronic acid allows the skin to absorb more moisture, plumping it up and reducing the appearance of fine lines and wrinkles. However, most certifying bodies would not authorise it as a component of organic skin care because it can not be manufactured non-synthetically, even though it occurs naturally in the skin.
"So what you tend to find is the certified organic creams are quite basic creams and they don't have the added antioxidants in there and anti-wrinkle ingredients because they're just not allowed to put them in," Mr Golding comments.
"At mypure, we carefully review all of the ingredients that are used in the products we stock and if there are any man-made ingredients there that have a dubious safety profile then we just don't stock the product," he concludes.
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