L’Oréal

A beauty conglomerate helps women farm sustainably—and earn more for it. The world's largest cosmetic brand takes aim at two goals with its Sharing Beauty With All initiative: It trains workers to harvest essential ingredients in sustainable ways, and its plan is to help those workers—most of whom are women in developing nations—keep a greater share of the rewards. In Burkina Faso, a top source of ingredients for the moisturizer shea butter, L'Oréal has trained some 37,000 women to harvest and process shea nuts while limiting deforestation. It also reduced the roles of some middlemen, increasing the farmers' incomes. Women in Madagascar (home of skin-care staple Centella asiatica) and India (hair-care ingredient guar gum) are benefiting from similar L'Oréal efforts.