L’Oréal Aus & NZ Partner With Great Barrier Reef Foundation, Announcing Large Investments

L’Oréal Groupe Australia and New Zealand have announced one of the largest investments to the Great Barrier Reef Foundation to pioneer new coral restoration efforts in the region.

L’Oréal Groupe Australia and New Zealand have announced today a new partnership with the Great Barrier Reef Foundation (GBRF), to help coral reefs withstand the devastating impacts of climate change.

L’Oréal Groupe is reinforcing its longstanding commitment to biodiversity with a 6th new
investment in coral reef regeneration with the Great Barrier Reef Foundation. Through the EUR 50M
Fund for Nature Regeneration, which has committed more than EUR 28million in projects to-date,
L’Oréal is engaging with partners with proven expertise to support in the regeneration of nature
such as GBRF.

“I’m delighted to announce one of the largest investments with the Great Barrier Reef foundation as part of the Eur 50M L’Oréal Fund for Nature Regeneration. Our objective is to plant 2 million heat-tolerant corals on the Great Barrier Reef by 2035 and to catalyse a new market for sustainable funding of these interventions based on a Coral Biodiversity Credit (CBC) scheme. The L’Oréal Groupe understands we have a role to play to contribute to important causes such as improving ocean and reef health,” said Alex Davison, CEO of L’Oréal Australia and New Zealand.

Australia’s own Great Barrier Reef is greater in size than the United Kingdom, Holland and Switzerland combined and is one of the most biodiverse ecosystems on our planet. It is home to around ten per cent of the world’s total fish species, and thirty different species of whales, dolphins, and porpoises have been recorded in the Great Barrier Reef. However, climate change is disrupting the delicate balance of the entire reef ecosystem, leading to species loss and declining ocean health. In fact, science is clear that if we do not intervene at scale within the next decade, 90 per cent of coral reefs will die by 2050 across the world.

The 10-year commitment from L’Oréal will fund an integral component of the world-leading Reef Restoration and Adaption Program (RRAP), a collaboration of Australia’s leading science organizations and the Great Barrier Reef Foundation to restore coral reefs in different ways.

As well as unlocking significant and required funding to sustain reef restoration efforts, the partnership will support critical reef interventions including the targeted deployment of two million heat-tolerant corals on the Great Barrier Reef by 2035. Corals with increased heat tolerance have the potential to reduce the impact of reef bleaching from marine heat waves.

The partnership will also see the development of a world-first method of calculating the value of coral reef biodiversity and support the deployment of corals with improved temperature tolerance. The goal is that the new methodology will enable a nature repair market and unlock much-needed funding for vital reef conservation efforts.

Nature repair markets are emerging as an effective way to finance the necessary acceleration and scaling of conservation activities to meet the global challenges that lay ahead. This largescale research and development program is also supported by a $100m investment from the Australian Government’s Reef Trust.

Great Barrier Reef Foundation managing director Anna Marsden said that “coral reefs around the world over are under threat, and without help they will not recover, adapt, and evolve quickly enough to withstand the impacts of climate change and local threats. L’Oréal’s significant investment in this landmark project which is catalysing the bold innovation required to restore coral reefs and the communities they are in”.

The L’Oréal Fund for Nature Regeneration is a 50-million-euro impact investment fund, operated by Mirova,
the asset management company affiliated to Natixis Investment Managers and dedicated to sustainable investment. It aims to support projects conserving or restoring natural habitats. More specifically, the portfolio
will include projects that support the regeneration of degraded land, mangroves as well the restoration of
marine areas and forests. Beyond ecological restoration, these projects will also help address the social needs
of surrounding communities through the development of sustainable livelihood opportunities (sustainable
agriculture and fisheries, ecotourism, commercialization of carbon credits). They will live in a healthier
environment, benefit from new economic opportunities and enhanced resilience to climate change:

• By 2030, the L’Oréal Fund for Nature Regeneration will have helped restore one million hectares of
  degraded ecosystems.
• By 2030, the Fund will have helped capture 15 to 20 million tons of CO2.
• It will have created hundreds of job opportunities.

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L’Oréal Australia & New Zealand is dedicated to its sense of purpose, “Create the beauty that moves the
world”.