Greenwashing gotchas in Korea give way to formal guidelines

Innisfree's paper bottle [SCREEN CAPTURE]

Greenwashing is all the rage in Korea as no price is to be paid for making exaggerated claims about the environmental-friendliness of a product.

Last year, Innisfree sold serum in a plastic bottle covered in paper and called it a paper bottle.

“Hello, I am paper bottle,” according to the words on the paper cover.

When Starbucks had a reusable cup day — customers were offered reusable cups with the purchase of a drink — a social media mob descended and called out the company, as most customers did not actually reuse the cups.

According to a KB Financial Group report, 31.6 percent of 1,000 KB Card users said they consider whether companies are involved in an environmental campaign when purchasing their products.

With the rise of greenwashing, the Fair Commission Trade (FTC) will soon be providing guidelines.

The United Nation’s COP27 also released guidelines related to greenwashing last month, to provide instructions and clarity for non-state actors which offer guidelines on “how-to ensure credible, accountable net-zero pledges.”

According to the report, companies need to set short-,mid- and long-term goals and submit specific plans on cutting the use of fossil fuels. They should also disclose their progress in achieving carbon neutrality.

The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) has provided guidelines on greenwashing, stressing that companies are responsible for providing exact information on environmental issues, including greenhouse gas emissions.

In Italy, a court ordered a micro-fiber product company to stop making green claims such as “eco-friendly microfiber” and “the first sustainable and recyclable microfiber.”

As the Fair Trade Commission has also started to set standards for greenwashing in Korea, it is anticipated that similar guidelines made by COP27 and the OECD will be included.

The FTC is currently preparing to amend regulations on ads and displays of environment-related phrases as the regulation was vague up to this point.

In March, an environmental group reported SK E&S for saying that “an environmental-friendly LNG era will come.” The FTC did not end up penalizing the company, saying the phrase is neither false nor an exaggeration for the time being as it is a plan suggested by the company.

“It would be fine to have campaign advertisements and explicitly describe the company’s future plans to improve the company’s image, but the issue is heavy promotion of environmental-friendly products,” said a spokesperson for FTC.

“We are planning to review how to make such judgment, whether the company's plan is false or not.”

BY JEONG JIN-HO [cho.jungwoo1@joongang.co.kr]