The appetite for light skin as a standard of beauty is boosting the growth of Nigeria’s multimillion-dollar skincare market, with many users ignoring the risks posed by some products.
Consumers are feeding the market with a robust demand for skin-bleaching products, making skincare one of the most vibrant segments of the personal care industry.
The Nigerian skin care e-commerce market is predicted to hit $61 million in 2023, according to ecommerceDB, a Statista-operated database.
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The segment accounts for 9.9 percent of the personal care e-commerce market, and analysts expect that the market volume will reach $88.9 million by 2027.
On a global scale, the skin-lightening industry is estimated to be worth $31 billion by 2024, according to a joint study of the use of skin fairness products by the Centre for Health and Social Sciences, Tata Institute of Social Sciences, India and the Centre for Appearance Research, University of the West of England, United Kingdom.
Data from Euromonitor show that of the $500 billion made from the retail sales of beauty products in 2019 globally, skincare products generated $120 billion, the second highest after $236 billion from personal care products.
Entrepreneurs, celebrities, and social media influencers have become mainstream marketers of various skin-altering products labelled as organic lighteners, whiteners, toners, evening creams, acne erasers and fading gels, among others.
Producers target all budget sizes of users with promotions all over supermarkets, neighbourhood stores and online platforms from TikTok to Instagram, Snapchat, Facebook and Twitter.
The prices of some sets of organic creams with hidden bleaching agents range from N10,000 to N100,000, depending on the intensity of the chemicals combined and buyers are often willing to pay a premium for what is perceived as pure natural formulation.
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While there are some producers who formulate products based on scientific research that has span decades, many are inspired by business trends and rarely involve experts in dermatology, formulation chemistry, toxicology, microbiology, or skincare consultancy.
Just a few manage to get approval from the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC) before selling to the public.
Dasetima Altraide, a professor of Medicine and Dermatology and a consultant physician at the University of Port Harcourt Teaching Hospital, Port Harcourt, told BusinessDay that most creams and soaps that are branded as organic products contain steroids and other harmful medications that are not indicated on the label or packaging.
He said the use of certain skin-lightening products could leave long-term skin disorders with users.
While promoters laugh all the way to the bank on booming sales, Altraide said users may have to grapple with risks such as exogenous ochronosis, a blue-black pigmentation; dyschromia, a patchy or irregular skin discoloration; or fish odour syndrome.
“It could also lead to fungal and bacterial infections in patients, some of which have been presented to our dermatology clinics for management. It is a pandemic,” the professor said. “A lot of people are making so much money from this as a result of passing wrong information to the public.”
Two weeks ago, a popular skincare brand often promoted by some celebrities, Jenny’s Glow, was called out by a number of users for the damaging effects caused on their skin, despite great reviews from influencers.
It later became clear that the NAFDAC certification number on some of the products had expired without renewal.
Chinwe Okoroafor, a former user of the brand said she was led to buy the product because a comedian she admired promoted it. But she found out she was misled after two weeks of use.
“I’ve used the product before. They are good for the first two weeks after which they start causing disaster on your skin,” Okoroafor said, reacting to an Instagram video of the brand being called out.
“It took me almost six months to recover from the damage despite that I didn’t use it for up to a month. And the reason I bought it was because I saw Warri Pikin advertising Jenny’s Glow.”
Another user said her sister developed stretch marks after spending over N100,000 on a set of the brand’s products.
“I bought her Egyptian soap and half-cast cream… It gave me a hard skin. My skin started scaling and it got worse on my feet. It’s almost two years and I’m still trying to clear off the dark knuckles and get back my skin,” Joy Chinenye said.
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Igbinoba Jennifer, the founder of Jenny’s Glow Skincare Enterprise, acknowledged the complaints after an initial denial and a resounding criticism from a media enthusiast with the Instagram handle @verydarkman1.
She pledged to work on the issues, saying: “I’m sorry to everyone I’ve offended. I’m taking accountability and I agree if you say the products are bad. I’m going to rebrand and fix everything. We are coming back stronger with better products.”
The brand is only one of many.
Edward Group, founder of Global Healing and a United States-based alternative health physician, said it is not always the case that organic skin care products are free from toxic chemicals or are composed of pure natural ingredients.
There are about 19 chemicals he recommends that consumers avoid in cosmetic, bath, and beauty products. They include butylated hydroxyanisole, borates, coal tar, formaldehyde, polyethylene glycol, mercury, hydroquinone, oxybenzone, triclosan and parabens.
Others are fragrance, phthalates, petroleum distillates, siloxanes and cyclomethicone, sodium lauryl sulfate and sodium laureth sulfate, toluene, retinol and retinyl palmitate/acetate, polytetrafluoroethylene aka teflon and nanoparticles.
A study of colourism and skin tone by the Department of Sociology and Anthropology, Mills College, United States shows that skin lightening is a legacy that has remained stuck in the culture of some postcolonial countries including Nigeria, Mexico, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Jamaica, the Philippines, Japan, India, Tanzania, Senegal, Uganda, Kenya, Ghana, and the US.
These products often contain one of three harmful ingredients: mercury, hydroquinone, or corticosteroids.
For instance, mercury is one of the chemicals of global concern flagged by the World Health Organization (WHO).
Even though it is used as a compound in pesticides, pharmaceuticals, paints, and traditional medicine, among other uses, the primary use of mercury in cosmetics is for skin-lightening creams, in which inorganic mercury is sometimes used as the active ingredient.
Mercury salts, according to WHO, prevent the formation of melanin, resulting in a lighter skin tone. The established limit of mercury for skin-lightening products is 1 milligram per kilogram, according to the Minamata Convention on Mercury.
The convention is a global treaty to protect human health and the environment from human-caused emissions and releases of mercury and mercury compounds.
It entered into force in 2017 and has been ratified by 114 countries as of 2019.
Yet, many cosmetic products contain mercury levels higher than that amount to increase the whitening effect, WHO says, noting that its products are easy to obtain despite being banned in many countries, including Nigeria.
The leading manufacturers of mercury-based skin-lightening products are Bangladesh, China, the Dominican Republic, Hong Kong SAR (China), Jamaica, Lebanon, Malaysia, Mexico, Pakistan, Philippines, the Republic of Korea, Thailand, and the US, WHO’s data show.
Findings by BusinessDay also indicate that Togo serves as a major hub for the import of mercury into West Africa, with a significant quantity making its way into Ghana and Nigeria.
Mercury may also be found in cosmetics for the eye area, such as mascara, and in eye makeup cleansing products, where it is used as a preservative. Mercury in cosmetics appears as inorganic and organic.
Inorganic mercury is used in skin-lightening creams and soaps while organic mercury compounds are used as cosmetic preservatives.
These forms of mercury differ in their degree of toxicity and have varying effects on the nervous, digestive, and immune systems, as well as the lungs, kidneys, skin and eyes.
Some of the adverse health effects of inorganic mercury contained in skin-lightening creams and soaps include kidney damage, skin rashes, skin discolouration and scarring, reduction in the skin’s resistance to bacterial and fungal infections, anxiety, depression, psychosis and peripheral neuropathy.
For Olufolakemi Cole-Adeife, a Lagos-based dermatologist, these effects are not far-fetched.
Four out of 10 patients she sees in a day suffer skin problems that are consequences of skin-lightening.
“Once there is a component of brightening or lightening or toning or glowing, they usually contain unsafe skin-lightening agents and one needs to be cautious,” Cole-Adeife told BusinessDay.
“I think more advocacy and education is needed. I also think NAFDAC needs to do a better job of regulating the cosmetics market.”
In April, NAFDAC revealed that 77 percent of Nigerian women used skin-bleaching products, citing a global study.
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The agency is responsible for the regulation of beauty products in Nigeria, ensuring the safety, quality, and efficacy of food, drugs, cosmetics, medical devices, and other regulated products in Nigeria.
Its regulations on beauty products cover ingredients, manufacturing, labelling, testing, distribution, and sale.
NAFDAC also has a number of enforcement mechanisms to ensure that beauty products comply with its regulations.
These mechanisms include inspections of manufacturing facilities, sampling and testing, recalls of non-compliant products, and prosecution of violators of NAFDAC regulations.
However, it can only do so much. The agency does not inspect all skin care products that are sold in the country. A lot of counterfeit and substandard products are able to bypass its enforcement, gaining free reign to pose a serious health risk to consumers.
“As long as the appetite for fairness does not wane, Nigeria may have a full-blown pandemic of skin orders on its hands,” an expert said.
