Ethical Sourcing and Sustainability: How to State a Claim You Can Actually Prove

International brands often arrive in the United States with language that was normal at home and expensive here. “Clean,” “eco,” “chemical-free,” and “FDA approved” show up on packaging that has not been checked against US rules. The fix is not a softer adjective. The fix is to say the thing you can prove, and to register what the law tells you to register.

AEG is not a law firm and not a regulatory consultant. The summary below is for brand and marketplace decisions. Have counsel confirm anything you print. The sources are the FDA and the FTC, current as of October 2026.

Cosmetics: MoCRA is a registration, not an approval

The Modernization of Cosmetics Regulation Act of 2022, Public Law 117-328, became law on December 29, 2022. It added section 607 to the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act. The FDA’s overview is the page to start with: MoCRA. What a cosmetics brand has to file before it sells in the US is in MoCRA for cosmetics brands.

Facility registration and product listing are mandatory. Existing facilities had to register by December 29, 2023. A new facility registers within 60 days of beginning to manufacture, or by February 27, 2024, whichever is later. The responsible person lists each cosmetic marketed in the United States, including ingredients, and updates the listing annually. Facility registration is renewed every two years. Changes at the facility are reported within 60 days. The operational page is FDA’s registration and listing guidance, and the FDA’s guidance PDF is the document to hand a manufacturer.

You can submit through Cosmetics Direct, Form FDA 5066 and 5067, or Electronic Submissions Gateway. The FDA does not issue a certificate of approval for a cosmetic because you registered or listed. “FDA approved” on a cosmetic is not a status MoCRA creates. Do not print it.

The small-business exemption in section 612 does not cover products for the eye area, products that are injected, products taken internally, or products that alter appearance for more than 24 hours. Failing to register or list is a prohibited act under section 301(hhh) of the FD&C Act. The old voluntary cosmetic registration program ended on March 27, 2023. A registration from that program does not satisfy MoCRA.

If you sell soap, read the definition before you assume you are outside cosmetics. A product marketed as a cosmetic, or one that makes a cosmetic claim, can still fall under the FD&C Act even when a true soap is regulated differently. When you are unsure, you are in the territory of counsel, not of a packaging designer.

Environmental claims: the Green Guides are still the 2012 guides

The FTC’s Guides for the Use of Environmental Marketing Claims, 16 CFR Part 260, were last revised in 2012. The current text is on the Electronic Code of Federal Regulations. The FTC’s own Green Guides page still points at that 2012 document. The Commission opened a regulatory review and has held the guides out as under review. As of October 2026 that review has not produced a new final Part 260 that replaces the 2012 text. Do not write packaging against a draft you saw summarized on a blog.

The guides are not a statute, and they do not give you a right. They are the Commission’s view of which environmental claims are deceptive under section 5 of the FTC Act. The Commission can still bring a case. The core instruction in section 260.2 is the one to remember: before you make the claim, you need a reasonable basis for every reasonable interpretation of it. For environmental claims, that basis often has to be competent and reliable scientific evidence.

A few consequences for a product page:

• “Eco-friendly” and “sustainable,” with no qualifier, are broad. If you cannot support the broad reading, do not use the word. Qualify a narrower truth: “bottle is 50 percent post-consumer recycled plastic,” and have the supplier letter that says so.
• “Recyclable” depends on whether recycling facilities that take the item are available to a substantial majority of consumers where you sell it. A symbol is a claim.
• “Free of” a chemical is a problem if the product never contained it, if the absence is legally required, or if the product contains something similar. It is also a problem if you highlight the absence of one substance to distract from another.
• Carbon and offset claims need the same substantiation. A badge from a program you have not read is not substantiation.

Amazon’s own climate badges are Amazon’s program. Qualifying for one does not replace the FTC standard. If you cannot defend the claim without the badge, do not put the claim in the bullets.

Origin and materials

“Made in France” is a country-of-origin claim. It has to be true under US customs rules for the product you are marking, which is a different analysis from a romantic brand story about a founder’s trip. Mark the origin you can support. Tell the longer story, if it is true, without blurring the mark.

Material claims belong in the same file as the spec sheet. If the listing says full-grain leather, vegetable-tanned, organic cotton, or natural rubber, the document that proves it should be in the brand’s hands before the ASIN goes live. A factory partner launching its own brand has an advantage here. It has the process. The disadvantage is the temptation to describe the process in factory language. Translate the fact, not the pride. “Cold-pressed in our Marseille plant” is useful if the plant is yours and the process is cold-pressed. “The purest ingredients in the world” is not a fact.

What this changes in the work

Compliance is part of market entry, not a sticker at the end. A cosmetic that is not listed should not be advertised. A retailer that will not receive a chemical-containing product until the formula is registered is a separate step: WERCSmart registration. A claim that fails the Green Guides should not be in the main image or the title, where it is hardest to take back. The listing essay is where those words would otherwise land. The launch essay is why this has to be done before the spend.

We will not publish a checklist that pretends to replace counsel. We will not call a product sustainable in a case study because the packaging is paper. The standard on this site is the same one we are asking brands to use: say what you can prove.

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If the US packaging still carries claims from the home market, send a brief or Book a strategy call.