L’Oréal chief executive officer Nicolas Hieronimus has always had an affinity for fragrance. But rather than take a victory lap while being inducted into the Hall of Fame at the Fragrance Foundation awards in New York on June 15, he used the time onstage to give an impassioned rallying cry.

[...] “In Europe, and by extension in other places like California, there are regulations being worked on with very little scientific background and with hasty decisions that may limit considerably the access to many raw materials, particularly naturals,” continued Hieronimus.

“Can you imagine fragrances without citrus, without bergamot, without jasmine, without rose?

— Read more in Fragrance Ingredients Are at Risk in the European Union at Women's Wear Daily via Yahoo.

The ‘challenge’ that the sector currently faces is that under proposed EU rules, fragrance ingredients will no longer be regulated on the basis of their dose, exposure and end use, but rather on their intrinsic properties. This is to say, they could be restricted because of what they contain not because of how they are meant to be used.

Such an approach, if implemented without consideration for the specific characteristics of fragrance could hammer entire olfactive families. These families make up the scents known and loved by consumers around the world, and their absence would be felt – and smelled!

— Read more in Building a future for European fragrance in a time of changing rules at EURACTIV.