Unilever has received the Corporate Consciousness Award at the 2019 To the Rescue! New York 10th Anniversary Gala, hosted by the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS). The award recognises Unilever’s work to end animal testing, including the company’s longstanding collaborations with the HSUS and Humane Society International (HSI).
Unilever has been developing alternatives to animal testing for assessing product safety for more than 30 years, and collaborating with leading scientists and policymakers to facilitate their adoption around the world. Last year, it became the first of the top 10 companies in the personal care sector to support calls for a global ban on animal testing for cosmetics, and to throw its support behind HSI’s global #BeCrueltyFree campaign, which is leading legislative reform in key beauty markets to prohibit animal testing of cosmetics.
The Head of Unilever’s Safety & Environmental Assurance Centre (SEAC), Julia Fentem, said “Every day, Unilever’s pioneering and talented team of safety scientists are using non-animal approaches to ensure that our products are safe for people and our planet, and I am so proud to be accepting this award on their behalf.”
In 2018, Unilever and HSI entered into a multi-year, open collaboration to develop capability across company and regulatory scientists globally so safety decisions for cosmetics can all be based on non-animal approaches; and to build capability for the long-term by investing in the training of future safety scientists in non-animal ‘next generation’ risk assessment.
President and CEO of the Humane Society of the United States, Kitty Block said, “We are so pleased to be honoring Unilever. Through its corporate efforts to end animal testing, and a long history of collaboration with the Humane Society family of organizations, Unilever has shown itself to be a true leader on this issue that impacts millions of animals.”
