Subj: Body Shop's hemp products blow up a storm in France   



Date: 28 Aug, 1998



Source: The Times



 

 

Body Shop's hemp products blow up a storm in France 

FROM SUSAN BELL 

IN PARIS 



Roddick: goods are success in Britain 



THE Body Shop may be prosecuted for promoting drug use after

French police raided a branch of the ecologically friendly retail

group in Aix-en-Provence. They seized stocks of hand lotion,

lip conditioner and body oil from the company's new hemp product

range, claiming that they encouraged the use of cannabis. 

The Body Shop products are made with industrial-grade hemp seed

oil extracted from the hemp plant, which is part of the cannabis

family. The oil does contain THC (tetrahydrocannabinol), the

compound that provides the "high" from marijuana, but only in

negligible quantities. 



"You'd have to smoke a hemp joint the size of a telephone pole

to get the least buzz and you'd die from carbon monoxide first,"

Anita Roddick, the founder of The Body Shop, said yesterday.

She expressed "amazement" at the action of the gendarmes, who

also seized all promotional material on the products during the

raid on Wednesday. 



The seized items were returned, but a report was submitted to

the public prosecutor in Aix-en-Provence. A spokesman for the

prosecutor's office said yesterday that any legal action would

probably focus on the packaging rather than the products. Posters

advertising the range show the hemp leaf. 



A Body Shop spokesman denied that the range encouraged drug use

and said the company's aim was to distance industrial hemp from

marijuana by educating people on the ecological benefits of cultivating

hemp and the uses to which it could be put. There are more than

25,000 known uses for hemp, including fuel, textiles, building

materials and fabrics. 



The hemp seed oil used to make the Body Shop products comes from

France, which Ms Roddick described as "being in the forefront

of the hemp revolution". 



The Body Shop launched the hemp products in its 22 shops in France

on Monday. The range has already enjoyed huge success in Britain

and America. In Britain, it accounted for 5 per cent of total

sales in April, a month after it was introduced.