Ladies, gentlemen, shareholders, good morning. It's my first AGM as Chairman of the Board of BIC. On behalf of Board members, I'm delighted to welcome you to BIC's shareholders' meeting in respect of FY 2022. This shareholders' meeting is being webcast live on our corporate website. A link will be available to listen to the streaming. I'd like to begin by introducing the Board members and management present in the room with us. Board members present today are Elizabeth Bastoni, Chair of the Compensation Committee and the Nominations, Governance and CSR Committee. Maëlys Castella, Chair of the Audit Committee and member of the Compensation Committee. Vincent Bedhome, representing employees and member of the Compensation Committee. Marie-Aimée Bich-Dufour, member of the Nominations, Governance, and CSR Committee. Édouard Bich, representing MBD and member of the Audit Committee. Timothée Bich. Pauline Chandon-Moët.
Héla Madiouni, Employee Representative. Candace Matthews, Member of the Audit Committee and the Nominations, Governance and CSR Committee. Jake Schwartz, Member of the Audit Committee. We're also pleased to welcome Carole Callebaut Piwnica and Véronique Laury. You are asked to approve their appointment as Directors are also present. Gonzalve Bich, Director and CEO. Chad Spooner, Chief Financial Officer, as well as certain members of the executive committee. Thomas Brette, Group Partnership and New Business Officer. Françoise Clément-Grandcourt, Chief Executive of the Lighters Business. Elizabeth Maul, Group Insights, Innovation and Sustainability Officer. Esther Wick, Group General Counsel, as well as Laura Vanhoutte, Secretary to the Board, who will act as Secretary for the Meeting. I would like you to kindly authorize the presence of journalists and analysts in the room.
This is the shareholders' meeting of BIC, priority will be given to the latter for the Q&A session. Are asked to act as scrutinizers. Mr. Édouard Bich, representing company M.B.D. shareholder and Director, and Mr. [Emmanuel Sepulchre], representing ODDO. I therefore declare our shareholders' meeting open, and I give the floor to Laura Vanhoutte.
Thank you, Chair. Let's begin by the notice of the meeting. The current assembly has been convened by a prior notice of meeting that was published in the BALO in its 5th of April issue and on the Journal Spécial des Sociétés and date of 26th of April, 2023. The present sheet and the quorum. The present sheet has been drawn up. Each of you signed this as you came in, either in your own right or as a proxy. On the basis of the present sheet certified by the members of the bureau that 1,300 shareholders, with representing 89.99% of the capital are present or represented.
Given that a quarter of the shares making up the capital and having voting rights are present or represented, the general meeting is properly set up and can deliberate validly both as an ordinary meeting and an extraordinary meeting. I will give you the final figures before we vote the resolutions. All of the documents are provided for by law are deposited here before me. They've been made available to the shareholders at the headquarters and on the internet site of the company in the usual time span. I'd like to remind you of the agenda. 22 items relating to the powers of the ordinary general meeting. The three first resolutions relate to approval of the accounts, corporate and consolidated, and attribution of income for FY 2022, as regards also the payment of dividends.
The 4th resolution relates to the report by the auditors on regulated conventions. The 5th resolution relates to authorization to be given to the Board to allow the company to intervene on its own shares. Regarding governance, resolutions 6-10 relate to the renewal of the mandates of Candace Matthews, Jake Schwartz, Timothée Bich as members of the Board. The nomination of two new members of the Board, Véronique Laury and Carole Callebaut Piwnica. Regarding the auditors, there are resolutions 11-14 which relate to the nomination of Ernst & Young to be the statutory auditor, replacing Deloitte, and the renewal of Grant Thornton Company, which will be a co-auditor. It's recommended that we not proceed with the renewal of company BEAS and company IGEC as alternate auditors.
Resolutions 15 to 22 relate to the approval of remuneration for FY 2022 and 2023, and in particular, remuneration of the Director General, the Chair of the Board, and the Board members. Five resolutions subsequently relate to the powers of the extraordinary general meeting. Resolution 23, the authorization of reducing share capital by canceling shares held by the company itself. Resolutions 24 and 25 relate to the increase in the capital set aside for the workforce and the increase in capital with a view to remunerating contributions in kind with the cancellation of the preferential subscription rights. Resolution 26 concerns the overall limits of the amount of issues that can be carried out by virtue of delegation of powers under resolutions 24 and 25. The 27th resolution is standard and relates to powers required to carry out the formal procedure.
This agenda was agreed by the Board on the 14th of February and the 17th of March, 2023. No shareholder has submitted draft resolutions. Thank you. I give the floor to Gonzalve Bich, Director General.
Mesdames et Messieurs. Ladies, gentlemen, dear shareholders, thank you for being here today or online for this AGM for FY 2022. Today marks the 50th anniversary of our first shareholders meeting in public that was held in June 1973. At this first AGM, my grandfather, Marcel Bich, addressed all his shareholders. Already at that first address, he highlighted the audacity, the individual responsibility, the balance between manufacturing excellent sales know-how, and lastly, his profoundly global ambition. Reading through his text again last week, I was struck by how his mindset was contemporaneous and to what extent those values are still with us today. All that is still part of our DNA today, and it's with considerable emotion that 50 years later, I'm addressing you today.
As regards the agenda for this morning, we'll begin by presenting the financial and non-financial results for 2022 and then the business of Q1, 2023, and then I'll move to the Horizon plan. When we launched it in 2020, it was to deliver our results and our targets to be more agile and consumer-centric. To be consumer-centric is to make sure that our products are available where and when our consumers wish to buy them. I've asked one of our sales team to present the progress of our French omni-channel distribution network, and I'm very pleased with that. Also, two members from Marne-La-Vallée plant will illustrate how our industrial know-how is one of the flagships of industry, notably French.
Sustainable development is at the heart of our concerns and our head of innovation and sustainable development, Elizabeth Maul, will present our progress. Then we'll watch a video on our work with the Tara Foundation. Diversity and education, a part and parcel of our DNA. I invite you all to come and discover the grand dictation that will bring together 2,000 participants on the finest avenue in the world, of which BIC is a partner. The Champs-Élysées will be transformed into a giant classroom on the 4th of June. Don't forget, I won't note your spelling mistakes. There might be a bit of red ink on some of the papers. We're going to address governance issues, and our auditors will present the audit report.
Lastly, we'll present the resolutions that will be submitted to your approval, and we'll take time to answer your questions before moving to vote on the resolutions. Let's begin with the highlights of 2022 that I'm gonna summarize in two slides. 2022 was a year of outstanding growth for our Group with sales growth across regions and for our three divisions. We were able to increase market share in our key markets, thanks to strong sales execution and the launch of new innovative products. Such a growth in sales requires that we invest to be ever more consumer-centric and maintain our lead that has been the Group's strength over the past 75 years. We've invested in marketing campaigns to support the brand and promote new products. We've also invested over 1% of sales in R&D to prepare tomorrow's growth.
We also undertook targeted acquisitions in high growth markets close to our business. Tattly in the field of ephemeral tattooing and AMI in augmented interaction for writing and drawing. In respect of FY 2022, we're proposing a dividend of EUR 2.56 per share. That's an increase of 19.1% versus the dividend paid in respect to 2021. That's a ratio of 50% of the adjusted net sales in 2022, in line with our capital allocation policy. This year we've launched a new share buyback program that can reach an amount of EUR 100 million. Total shareholder return could reach EUR 211 million.
That would represent a significant increase of 57% compared to total return of EUR 134 million of FY 2022 and 76% since the launch of the Horizon plan. Over now to Chad Spooner, our CFO, and Françoise Taine, Vice President, Group Controller, to go into the details of our financial results.
[Foreign language] Thank you, Gonzalve. Good morning. I'm Chad Spooner, BIC CFO. 2022 was a further year of strong results for the company. We're very proud of the double-digit growth in our sales and our operational performance. Now for more details, I'm pleased to introduce Françoise Taine.
Merci. Thank you, Chad. I have to say, your French is getting better by the day. Hello, everybody. I'd like to present to you, BIC's consolidated results for financial year 2022 and the first quarter of 2023. I will conclude with the outlook for the year as a whole. Let's begin with an overview of key financial figures for 2022. We had excellent performance with net sales that were up 13.8% in constant currency. Adjusted EBIT and net earnings per share also were in double-digit growth figures. The free cash flow before acquisitions and divestitures amounted to EUR 204 million. That includes EUR 96 million in industrial investment.
By the end of December 2022, the net cash flow position was EUR 360 million, after EUR 74 million of acquisitions, in particular Inkbox. The good performance is not just related to financial data. I'd like to talk a little bit about non-financial data for FY 2022. Sustainable development is part of BIC's DNA, and I am pleased to present to you the progress achieved over a number of years regarding a number of key performance indicators. In 2022, we made considerable headway when it comes to plastic. 70% of our packaging is reusable, recyclable or compostable. That's an increase of 10.4% as compared to 2021. We've also increased the proportion of recycled or alternative plastic in our products.
We've gone up from 4% in 2021 to 5.7% in 2022. We have also helped to improve learning for 187 million children worldwide since 2018. Our goal is to get to 250 million children by 2025. There's still room for improvement, in particular in reducing the amount of virgin plastic used in our products. We are well on track to reach our 2025 and 2030 goals. I'd now like to come back to financial performance. As expected, in 2022, we had double-digit growth for the sales, this is in constant currency, for all of our divisions.
If we drill down a little bit, you can see that Human Expression division was driven by good performance in Europe, North America, India and particularly in Latin America, and this notably during the back to school period. Furthermore, we have gained in market shares. We've had major advertising campaigns, and we've got a good product mix price ratio. All of this has led to growth in all of the key regions for the Flame For Life division. Finally, Blade Excellence performed very well, thanks to ongoing success of high value added segments, particularly in Europe, Latin America and in the United States. Let's now look at how our Adjusted EBIT figures have evolved over 2022, down 1.3% as compared to the previous year. This is mainly due to the macroeconomic framework with cost inflation and unfavorable currency developments.
Although we did benefit from an operational leverage effect linked to growth in sales. Given this specific situation, we've continued to invest in order to sustain long-term growth. I'd now like to take a look with you at the results for the first quarter of 2023. The sales figure for the quarter is up 4.3% in constant currency. This growth is due to solid sales execution, both online and in store, for the Human Expression and Blade Excellence divisions, particularly in Latin America, in India, in the Middle East, and in Africa. The drop of the Adjusted EBIT is due to the deterioration of the gross margin and an increase in operational expenditure and expenditure to support the brand.
I would like to point out that the margin for the first quarter of 2022 benefited from very favorable underpinnings resulting from marked growth of sales for the lighter division in the U.S. at that time. Our free cash flow before acquisitions and divestitures was negative, this is mainly because we've been building up stocks with a view to the 2023 back to school season. By way of conclusion, I would like to look with you at the outlook for financial year 2023. Growth of sales over the year is expected to be between +5% and +7% in constant currency, thanks to the combined effect of price increases and a better product mix and higher volumes. We are expecting to have an improved Adjusted EBIT and better EBIT margin in 2023.
We intend to continue investments, particularly investments in supporting the brand, so as to be able to carry out our Horizon plan and to support profitable growth in the long term. The generation of free cash flow should be higher than EUR 200 million, this for the fifth year in a row. I'd like to thank you for your attention, I'll now give the floor back to Gonzalve.
Merci, Françoise. Thank you, Françoise, for that clear summary of our results and outlook for 2023. As I indicated in my introduction, the remarkable performance of our Group in 2022 are the result of the success of our Horizon plan and the commitment of our teams in a challenging macroeconomic climate. Faced with these challenges, our Horizon plan has delivered. I'm proud to say that our strategy is bearing fruit. A key point of the delivery of the Horizon plan is the strengthening of our operational levers, as shown on this slide. Each of these levers is a key success driver. Today, our people and I will enter into greater detail here. The Horizon plan allows our teams to be ever more agile, focusing on profitable growth. One of the levers is to strengthen sales excellence.
We must constantly improve the consumer experience at sales points and online platforms. Innovation is paramount, and it must be consumer centric. Our three divisions are built in a way as to respond to consumer needs. We plan to broaden our horizon and expand into high potential adjacent markets with targeted acquisitions. Two examples in 2022, Tattly, company in the field of ephemeral tattooing, and the French startup AMI that I referred to a moment ago. These two acquisitions open up new horizons for each of our divisions. In conclusion, as you can see on this slide, a few key figures that shows the progress that we've achieved in 2022.
Without going into the full detail, I above all want to show you that we're steering our Horizon plan very precisely with key indicators that we track month after month, year after year, across all our levers. We're gaining market share. We're increasing our online sales. We're reducing the number of our SKUs whilst increasing the sales of each one. Lastly, we're reducing our CO2 emissions and increasing the portion of recycled or recyclable material in the manufacturing of packaging. In summary, our Horizon plan has entered a period of strong momentum, and we're all confident in our ability to achieve the ambitious targets that are attached to that plan. You'll see that this is but a beginning, and I thank you for your attention. I'm now gonna hand over to Samiya Sahridj, who will talk to you about sales excellence at BIC in France
Thank you, Gonzalve. Hello, everybody. I'm Samiya Sahridj. I'm Director of Sales Development for the France and Benelux region, and in particular, I'm in charge of digital and online sales. Over the next five minutes, I'd like to show you in very concrete terms how we are implementing our strategy in France with all three categories, so that BIC can become a very visible leading brand, easily seen by consumers in all points of sale, wherever it is that they buy, including online. Talking about online sales, we all know that this is now a major sales channel in our lives, particularly following the COVID crisis. At BIC, we are well on Board, we've developed our sales on most on sale online sale sites in France.
Our online sales increased markedly in 2022. Now represent 13% of our sales in France. We're the leading brand for stationery. Our market share on Amazon is 22% with a 4% increase in our market share in 2022. As for click and collect, which represents online sales for retail mass market, we're also the leading brand, 40% of the market. We're growing. You can't talk about writing without talking about Back to School. There BIC is the number one, a leading brand with outstanding growth. In 10 years, we have gained 7% of market share. That brings us up to 46% of the total market in 2022. In concrete terms, what does that mean?
It means that, every second product bought during the Back to School period is a BIC product, 1 in 2. This means that we've kept in step with changing consumer habits, and there's still very strong demand for our products. What's the key to our success? It's our ability to make sure that the brand is always visible, high impact during the Back to School period. Here you can see on the slide, how we've changed over time, but our philosophy is still valid today. Our philosophy can be summed up as one BIC seen is a BIC sold. This still works today, and this is the formula that we continue to use for all channels, including online, so that consumers can find their essential Back to School BIC products so whatever channel they use for their purchases.
BIC is an iconic set of products, they keep up to date to meet consumer expectations. One example of this is the 4-Color pen. It's the number one on-trend product at the moment. It's a collector's item in school playgrounds everywhere. They swap it, they collect it, and I'm sure that all of you have got a 4-Color pen on your person. We have record sales at the moment in France. Just to give you an order of magnitude, we sell 65,000 of these pens every day with marked growth over the last five years, 8.2% on average annually. We're not going to stop there. We're going to continue to support this star iconic product. We've got a number of in-store and online initiatives to do this.
For instance, every month we're going to be launching new collections on our site, bic.com. We've got a whole new concept with the four color bar, you can see this on the right, that we're rolling out in store at the moment and will be very visible during the Back to School season. Consumers will be able to find the whole range of 4-Color pens available. You can also customize your 4-Color pen. There'll be an engraving service in the Bureau Vallée store chain. This store chain developed a video that they put on TikTok about this, and there'll be more than 1 million views of that video showing how you can have your pen engraved. I'd now like to talk about lighters. Lighter here, too, is the number one leader on the market and has been for years now.
We have more than 8% of market share for hypermarket and supermarket outlets. We are also leaders in convenience store sales. In 2023, as Françoise said, we're going to be stepping up investment in the brand and particularly lighters. In order to support easy reach innovation, we're going to be rolling out the great communication campaign that was tried out in the U.S. with the international rap star Snoop Dogg. It was a big hit in the U.S., and we're hoping to do just as well in France. It was launched at the end of April with a 100% digital communication campaign and a high impact display in mass market retail, tobacconists, and online.
Finally, in the shaving division, BIC has 23% of market share for non-rechargeable razors. We're very proud because we've seen very strong growth in 2022 with a 2% increase in market share. Our pillars here are clear. We want to give new momentum to our classic razor range. We want to focus on quality and good value. That's important at the moment. Develop the rechargeable razor category and accelerate sales for new channels, particularly online. In September 2023, France will be hosting the key sporting event of the year, which is the Rugby World Cup. We have an amazing French team at the moment with lots of young players. They did brilliantly in the Six Nations. This team is quite likely to become the world champions, and BIC intends to support them all the way.
In order to support growth for our razors, we set up a partnership with three highly talented players from the France team, Romain Ntamack, Arthur Vincent, and Matthis Lebel, and we're going to be scoring plenty of tries with them. With our consumers, we've got a campaign which is 100% digital in the sporting press throughout the World Cup, and in store with high impact displays and online with sales promotion campaigns on the main online sales sites in France. Our sales excellence would not be possible without our factories. I suggest that we now have a look at a short video of our Marne-La-Vallée factory that will be commented on by Fabrice Dieudonat, who's the Director of the factory there, and Mélanie Laget, who's in charge of production.
Well, it's always a surprise to see on video what we experience every day. Good morning. With Mélanie, we're delighted to have this opportunity to talk to you about our manufacturing excellence. We have a high mastery of our manufacturing processes and the knowledge, that is to say design, manufacturing of our molds and machine, and that since 1950. Here are a few items to illustrate our manufacturing footprint worldwide.
We'll speak. In 2022, 92% of the Group's sales was achieved with products made in our own factories. We have 24 factories worldwide, six in France. That's 1/4 of our factories overall. 29 million products sold every day. The satisfaction rate is beyond reproach, and this is because we're in full control of production.
That's clear. BIC has manufacturing knowhow and expertise forged over 70 years. We constantly challenge our manufacturing capability. Our daily target is to accelerate rates without having an impact on the quality of the products we manufacture.
Indeed, this is one of the challenges that we have at Marne-La-Vallée for iconic 4-Color pen. In 2012, we produced 90,000 4-Color pens a day with one single production line. In 2022, 300,000 and three production lines. We've tripled production volumes and at the same time stepped up the pace of output.
How do we face up to increased industrial volumes? We upped our production capacity. We invested in three new manufacturing lines. We developed technical solutions to have 10% additional productivity on each of these lines.
Don't forget, we've also reduced the time it takes to make the products and improve the performance of the machine that has gone from 75% to 82%. That's the production capacity of the machine. In other words, we have exponentially higher production than we did 10 years previously. We have succeeded in implementing robust action plans, and these have helped us keep production at optimal level.
It's true, we adapted real time to market changes and to consumer demand to maintain a high level of industrial efficiency. We remain agile. We constantly reviewing our manufacturing processes to adapt to technological changes but also changing consumer demand. They expect more personalization of our products, as we saw earlier with Samiya, and better environmental footprint.
That's true. With the Horizon Plan, BIC has gone all out consumer centric. An example of this is that 10 years ago we only had one 4-Color pen with a blue barrel. We now have 43 different versions. We've got customized production now, and this means the production series are shorter. This means that the machines have to be stopped regularly in order to change the production, and we've adapted well to keep productivity high.
Mélanie, we talk a lot about productivity. Yeah, that's true. You could ask yourself, what about sustainable development and all that? We have a target 50% using recycled plastic in our products between now and 2030. To get there, we must remain agile, creative to maintain production rates while developing technical solutions to reach that target.
One concrete example of what's done for sustainable development at Marne-La-Vallée, we've reduced the weight of the barrel of the BIC Cristal pen by 10%. This is produced all over the world, and this means that globally we save EUR 1 million worth of material used for this pen. We've done this without having a negative impact on the production process and without additional costs. Of course, that counts.
We're proud of our achievements. All our teams are motivated and excited at the idea of reducing our environmental footprint whilst remain consumer-centric. Our know-how amongst the best industry standards. We plan to maintain this lead across all our plants.
Well, there you have it. I hope that you will be able to come to our factory one day to see for yourselves what you saw on the video. Thank you very much.
Thanks, Mélanie Fabrice for this presentation, highlighting our manufacturing. Excellent. Elizabeth Maul will go back on our progress in terms of sustainable development. Elizabeth, please.
Hello, everybody. I'm Elizabeth Maul, and I'm in charge of insights, innovation, and sustainable development at BIC. Sustainable development is a subject that is of key importance to us. It's close to our hearts and has been for a long time. Showing stewardship for our planet and for our fellow citizens is a cornerstone of our DNA and our corporate identity. Right from the start, BIC has been recognized by consumers as producing long-lasting, sturdy products. These products are made with as little raw materials as possible. In the 90s, we were one of the first companies in the world to apply ecodesign and life cycle assessment principles to the full range of our products, and then in 2004, we launched our first sustainable development program. Today, buying wisely and well is a priority for consumers.
Consumers are drawn to sustainable and environmentally mindful companies. Studies show that environmentally aware consumers will account for more than 50% of the global population by 2029. It's a huge stake for brands. With our Horizon program, we have stepped up our commitment in favor of sustainable development. It's now a strategic and operational must. We have to be able to respond to consumers' new expectations. This is a major factor to remain competitive. It's also important for the way in which our brand is perceived and for BIC's growth. We have a sustainable development program called Writing the Future, Together. We've made firm commitments. We are going to significantly reduce our environmental footprint, carbon emissions, and the use of raw materials to make our products. We're going to reduce our packaging and the environmental footprint of our activities generally, between now, 2025, and 2030.
This is not a plan that's set in stone. We are constantly adjusting it so that we can adapt to new expectations and requirements. For instance, two years ago we undertook to source all of our electricity from renewable supply sources. Last year we went a step further. We announced new long-term reduction objectives for our greenhouse gas emissions. It's the first time in BIC's history that we have made such a commitment. I'm very proud that we've done so. This is a brave initiative. It will make us strong for the future. This ambition is also reflected in our products. We have undertaken to use 50% of recycled or alternative plastics by 2030 and to have 100% of our packaging made from reusable, recyclable, or compostable plastic by 2025.
In order to improve decision-making right from product engineering, BIC has developed and put in place our own assessment tool. We use this to evaluate existing and new products, we score these products from the environmental and societal point of view. Sustainability is of importance to all of us, no one can go it alone. We need to pull together, this will mean we have the most impact. This is why we work hand in hand with researchers, with startup companies, with industrial partners, and NGOs in order to generate new ideas and to benefit from their expertise. One specific example is the pilot project that our Flame For Life division has put in place working together with scientists so as to better understand the impact that our products might have on the oceans and to do better.
We put in place this program on the basis of the work done by a foundation called the Tara Foundation, and I'm delighted to be able to share a video with you with a testimonial from Romain Troublé, who's the Director General of that foundation, and he will be talking about how industrialists and NGOs can work together to promote wellbeing for us all.
My name's Romain Troublé, CEO of the Tara Océan Foundation. I'm gonna talk to you about cooperation between BIC and Tara. Very novel, very innovative cooperation between a manufacturer and a scientific NGO. Tara Foundation recognized working with public scientific research on the planet's ocean. Ocean's very important, its health is, we all depend on it. Our life comes from there, our life is sustained by the oceans. It's one of the lungs of the planet. With Tara, over the years, we crisscrossed the worlds discovered biodiversity issues, climate change challenges, pollution issues, plastic from chemicals as I speak to you. That's why Tara Océan navigates, been working for 20 years. 20 years this year. It has a vessel, a 36 m yacht that sails the world with scientists 300 days a year, I'd say.
Public fundamental research scientists, devoted to ocean research. All this expertise developed with loads of researchers and labs made available to the transition. They know how to convince our young people in French and French-speaking schools, convince the public through the media, politicians, of course, every level, national, European, international, but also for industry. Support industry in change, in the transition. When we met with BIC a few years ago, BIC was the lighters division, had lots of questions. How to measure the impact, where was the impact, how tomorrow imagine a recyclable lighter division. Virtuous and fundamental research didn't yield answers to all the questions raised by the lighters division at BIC.
That's why the BIC Sea project was put together with BIC, the Tara Foundation, and other research labs to identify what the issues were more pragmatically to set up the right solutions. Not to devise one solution today that would create problems elsewhere. To find lasting solutions beyond convictions, to be very pragmatic and measured in our approach. BIC's initiative, the lighters division is very novel. There are rarely partners with whom we've worked like this. We don't arrive with our solutions or the scientists who give their view. It's constant interaction between the teams of the lighters divisions, the scientists and ourselves. It's a good example of cooperation between the teams. It's very interesting. We discover manufacturing issues. We discover what it means to make industrial choices, invest hundreds of millions of Euro in manufacturing.
We don't always find that dimension in NGO. My congratulations to BIC. It's rare to come across a company that's so motivated with so much ambition, to find solutions, reduce its impacts in such a sincere and committed way, and I hope the lighters division will inspire other divisions in the company and that other industries will learn from this experience and follow this determination to find lasting, tangible and realistic solutions.
At BIC, our workforce is the motor of the Horizon plan. We want to create a workplace universe that's positive and will support personal fulfillment and also help us to retain talent. What this means on a day-to-day basis is that we want to offer a workplace environment that reflects the diversity of our clients and to create a workplace that is both fair and inclusive, where everybody can fulfill their potential. Our objective is to ensure that 40% of managerial positions are held by women by 2027. We are anxious to make sure that all the women who work for us in our company feel they are respected and are confident that they can voice their ideas. Let's ensure that each voice is not only heard but also listened to and taken into account.
In this spirit, the BIC Foundation is also investing to support women. I suggest we look together now at a video that will illustrate this and can be commented on subsequently by Athina Marmorat, who's the Founder and CEO of the association called Rêv'Elles .
For me, inclusion at BIC is something that happens on a day-to-day basis as a matter of course. We work with people from all over the world, that's what gives us the energy to carry on. I can't imagine working for another company. I love being able to work with different backgrounds, people from different cultures. My job is a global job. I work with people from all over the world, it's great. My career development was supported in a number of ways at BIC.
First of all, my own manager, who has always supported me actively and encouraged me to think out of the box, as they say, to encourage me to be creative and to take initiatives, to launch new ideas. I've also had a lot of support from just about everybody here at BIC. Everybody has taught me a lot. I'm being really fortunate. I've worked with managers who trusted me and who identified my potential and helped me to fulfill it, helped me to acquire new skills and gave me new missions. It was great. That helped me to fulfill my potential, and I was also fortunate to be able to benefit from training programs that are available in the company, particularly a mentoring program that really was an eye-opener for me.
Regarding me, I'm speaking personally here, I feel very comfortable in the lighter division and at BIC generally as a woman. I feel it's inclusive, I'm a woman who wants to have a real career. I want to build a career, and I've got my personal background, and I feel that that's valued in the team. What really counted for me in developing my career at BIC, well, the two things really. First of all, lots of opportunities. I was working in a site that was growing fast, with lots of opportunities for development. What was really key was the managers I had who were so encouraging. They have always supported me. They've always set challenges for me, and I managed to rise to those challenges.
In the past, there weren't many women engineers or managers in factories and especially not young women. I was put in charge of the shaving section, the razor, and I wasn't even 30. I've met women from all backgrounds, Ukrainian, Polish, Vietnamese, French. A lot of them had partners and were childbearing age, but it didn't make any difference here. What really counts for me is your personality, your motivation, and your potential.
Hello. Hello, everybody. My name is Athina Marmorat. I'm the founder of the Rêv'Elles Association. I thought that's a great video. It really makes me want to come and work for BIC. I think maybe I'll apply. It's great to see that. What is Rêv'Elles?
It's an association I set up 10 years ago. It was because I'd noted something. I used to go around to secondary schools in underprivileged areas and talk about careers guidance. Whenever I talked to the girls, I said, "What do you want to do later on?" They would always reply the same thing, "I want to be a secretary or personal assistant or look after small children or maybe on the ground staff of an airline company." It was a mystery to me. I thought, "Well, why is it that they don't want to be architects? Why don't they have other dreams? Why don't they want to be authors, or why don't they want to be an activist in a association?" I thought about it.
I talked to the girls themselves, I talked to their teachers, I realized that the girls in these underprivileged areas couldn't even imagine having a job other than the ones they quoted because they didn't have any role models. If you want to have the same opportunities for girls and boys, you must ensure that they can have the same dreams. If there are no women architects, if the girls don't know about women architects, they can't imagine they could become an architect.
I thought, "Let's get the girls together by themselves, give them a safe space where they can talk things through, where they can gain in confidence and open up their horizons, think beyond what they see on a day-to-day basis, and encourage them to act." We organize programs that work on those three pillars and give them the tools, the skills, how do you think through a career plan, what kind of questions you should be asking yourselves, but above all, to have a better understanding of themselves, of their talents, and work on their personal development. Just like in BIC, I'm convinced that you have to begin by changing the way you see yourself. If you see yourself differently, then you will interact differently with others, and at the end of the day, you will have a different vision of the future for yourself.
I'm very proud to be here. We have had the support of the BI C Foundation for three years now. The BIC Foundation supported our landmark program for personal potential. It's over five months, and the aim is to boost girls' self-confidence. BIC has also been supporting our other program called RVL Ta Parole, Reveal Your Voice. We've got Reveal Your Potential and Reveal Your Voice. After going through these programs, these campaigns, the girls want to speak out. They want to talk about who they are. They are more critical. They have the courage, the confidence to speak out. That's why we have the second program, Reveal Your Voice, Your Eloquence, to help them take the floor. We've got a podcast called the Rêv'Cast. Over the next three years, we're going to be working on this.
We've got a really high-value partnership with BIC, and it will continue over the coming three years. This will help us to develop this podcast called Rêv'Cast, and also this new program, Reveal Your Voice. We've done so much over the last three years. The girls have come to see factories. They've discovered BIC and the factory. They can see that a company is not just going to work, it's more than that. It's social ties. It's working in a team. It's opening up new opportunities, broadening your horizons, and it's changed their vision of the corporate world. There are women at BIC who have high jobs, high-level jobs, and they're role models, and they come and talk to the girls. The girls have discovered that there are so many different types of jobs in BIC.
Another form of cooperation is that four of these girls co-created, co-designed a BIC pen on the 8th of March, International Women's Day. It's been sold every year over that day for the last two or three years. A EUR 1 is paid back to the foundation for every pen sold. Thanks to this cooperation with BIC, the girls have been able to develop new skills, try them out, have discovered the corporate environment, have discovered new lines of work, new job opportunities. This partnership is so very rich because it brings out a real transformation of these young women. But also, the women who work for BIC as well, changed. There's a mirror effect.
The girls, these young women from the underprivileged areas see what's happening in the company. They talk about it with me, and that makes me rethink. You see that somebody who's very shy, who never speaks out, all of a sudden grabs the microphone and starts to talk. That makes me think about myself. What is it that I don't dare to do? Where is it that I'm self-censoring myself? It's a win-win partnership. It really is. Thank you so very much for the trust you've shown in us. All of you here, because you're shareholders, you've entrusted my foundation. I think that if we have this kind of partnership, we can really begin to change the world. There are so many challenges that lie ahead. United, we are stronger. Thank you.
If you don't believe in yourself, nobody's going to believe in you. The Rêv'Elles Association is based on the fact that we've seen that young girls from underprivileged areas made poor career choices. They tended to choose dead-end jobs which weren't in keeping with their true potential. RVL is a supplement to the education system and to what's done elsewhere because what we do when girls have to make career choices, we give them the chance to have a transformative experience. It's a safe space. We feel we can really be ourselves, we can speak out. We focus on three objectives. The first objective is to help build self-confidence. If you trust yourself, then you can push your limits. You can step outside your comfort zone. You have more confidence. You believe in what you can do. Open up new horizons.
I think that Rêv'Elles gives you more ambitions. You want to aim higher, do better, and also help them to act, to forge ahead, to evolve. Nobody can stop you if you really want to do it. It's up to you. You're the one who can decide what you're going to do in life.
Ladies and gentlemen, we're now going to move on to the governance part of the general meeting, and I'm going to give the floor to Nikos Koumettis, Chairman of the Board.
Thank you, Laura. Ladies and gentlemen, I propose we now move to governance. Before beginning, I'd like to thank warmly Pauline Chandon-Moët for her 20 years on the Board. Elizabeth Bastoni for her 10 years of office. Thanks to both of you for your precious contribution to the work of the Board. A few words to tell you about the way your Group's governance is organized. The Board of Directors is tasked with defining the Group's strategy. It is comprised of three specialized committees, the Compensation Committee, the Audit Committee, and the Nominations, Governance, and Corporate Social Responsibility of the Group. In order to implement this strategy, the chief executive relies on an executive committee comprising 10 members. Of which 40% are women and of three nationalities. This committee reflects our Group's diversity.
Our Board met on eight occasions in 2022 with a participation rate of 98.8% demonstrating thereby the commitment of our Directors. Aside from its usual missions, the Board worked and ruled in 2022 on various operational, strategic, and financial matters. This year, we worked on the Group's long-term strategy, notably on the implementation of the Horizon plan and the Group's M&A strategy. We've also monitored the progress of the Group as regards sustainable development, as well as the share buyback program and the free share grants to employees. Furthermore, we assessed the Board's performance with an outside consultant and worked on the composition and evolution of the Board. Throughout the year, your Board benefited from the expertise of its three specialized committees: the Audit Committee, the Compensation Committee, and the Nominations, Governance, and CSR Committee.
Maëlys Castella, Chair of the Audit Committee, and Elizabeth Bastoni, Chair of the Compensation and Nominations and Governance and CSR Committee will now present to you the reports of their respective committees. I'll hand over to Maëlys Castella for the report of the Audit Committee, please.
Thank you, Nikos. Ladies and gentlemen, shareholders, as you will have seen, the composition of the Audit Committee is unchanged as compared to last year. It is made up of four members, two women and two men. 75% are Independent Directors. In the course of 2022, the Audit Committee met six times. The presence rate was 95.8%. Our work this year focused on the following. The results of the internal audit and control missions, and a study of cash flow, in particular liquidities, bank loans, and currency hedging, and the impact of inflation. We also carried out a review of potential acquisitions, and we analyzed the acquisitions that have been made. We looked at the follow-up of the share buyback program and a review of risk management and financial operations. We also looked at insurance and costs.
Finally, our work related to the review of the handover process relating to the change in one of our auditors for 2023. In this respect, we would like to point out that in 2021, a selection process guided and followed up by the Audit Committee was set in place in order to select the auditors that would replace the Deloitte. Four audit firms were reviewed during the call for tender. After studying each of these and the presentations made by each of the firms, the selection committee drew up a shortlist of two candidates. The Audit Committee decided to recommend to the Board Ernst & Young, and we're putting their nomination to you for the vote today.
With a view to this nomination, the Ernst & Young, Deloitte, and BIC teams have began to work on the handover in cooperation with Grant Thornton, whose mandate as the co-auditor will continue. I would like to take advantage of this opportunity to warmly thank the Deloitte teams who have worked with BIC since 1999. I will now give the floor to Jérémy Thurbin, who will talk to you about the Ernst & Young audit company, which will be the statutory auditor to replace the Deloitte company, provided, of course, you vote in favor of that measure.
Ladies and gentlemen, shareholders, good morning. My name's Jérémy Thurbin. I'm extremely honored to represent EY, Ernst & Young audit before you today in respect of the 11th resolution on which you'll be asked to vote shortly. Since the selection process described by Maëlys Castella a moment ago, we had the opportunity of meeting with Group management on several occasions at head office, both internationally and present our teams and thereby present our first intervention to the half-yearly close at June 30th, 2023 with Grant Thornton here present. We also had an opportunity to meet with Deloitte & Partners, represented by Mr. Jean-Pierre Agazzi, and shortly will begin a handover process to his team.
I'd like to thank all these individuals, company management as well as my colleagues for their assistance during this transition, this handover, and we're prepared to serve you as statutory auditors as of now. Over now to Elizabeth Bastoni.
Merci, Jeremy. Thank you, Jeremy. Dear shareholders, ladies and gentlemen, the Compensation Committee is made up of three members, 100% are independent. It met four times in the course of 2022. Our work related to the compensation policy for the Chairman, for the members of the Board, for the CEO. The committee also reviewed compensation for the executive committee members. We worked on long-term performance criteria to be included in the non-fixed compensation plans and the general policy regarding share allocation for all of the participants. We pursued our consideration of the philosophy and the structure of variable compensation within the Group. Together we reviewed all of the Say on Pay documentation in the universal registration document for 2022. I'd now like to present to you in more detail the compensation policy. We are asking you to vote on this policy.
Regarding the Chairman of the Board, he's the only Non-Executive leader of the company, and his compensation is made up solely of a fixed part. He is not entitled to a non-fixed compensation plan or a share-based plan or benefits in kind. For financial year 2023, we are not suggesting a modification to be made to the compensation to be granted to the Chairman of the Board. We are suggesting this remains fixed at EUR 300,000 a year. Regarding the Directors, and this on the recommendation of the Compensation Committee, the Board has adopted a compensation policy for Non-Executive Directors, which is in line with the requirements of French law. Last year, the compensation policy for Directors was reviewed for the three-year period going from 2022-2024.
The amounts paid out under FY 2022 are in keeping with that policy. The amounts allocated depend on the role played, the responsibilities, and the participation of Board members. For FY 2023, this compensation policy will remain unchanged, the overall envelope will be increased by EUR 550,000 from EUR 550,000 to EUR 600,000 so as to take into account the overlap for compensation in May because of the change in Directors. The total compensation for the CEO for financial year 2022 is made up of three parts. There's a fixed part, there's a non-fixed part, which will be paid out subject to your approval.
It represents 158.73% of the fixed part for the year, and the final element is long-term non-fixed compensation in the form of performance shares with an acquisition period of three years. Regarding the non-fixed part of compensation for FY 2022, I would like to point out that the objectives set for the CEO are closely related to the financial objectives of the Group. The financial objectives are determined on the basis of the annual budget as established at the budget rate on the recommendation of the Audit Committee and after approval by the Board. You can see here the details of the non-fixed compensation for Gonzalve Bich for financial year 2022.
The targets set by the Board at its meeting on the 15th of February 2022 were the following: growth in sales of constant currency of 6.6%, growth of Adjusted EBIT of 6.4%, and 202 days of cash flow conversion cycle. The Board also validated at 130% the achievement of the individual goals by the CEO for financial year 2022. The annual bonus for 2023 will be calculated on the basis of the same three financial criteria, with objectives in line with guidelines communicated to the markets and also individual objectives which will relate to qualitative and measurable parts of the transformation plan. In line with recommendations made by AFEP-MEDEF, the Board has included a measurable climate objective in the individual objectives set for Gonzalve Bich for 2023. Thank you. Laura.
I'm giving you the floor back now because you're going to be talking on behalf of the Nominations, Governance and CSR Committee.
Thank you very much. It's me again, Elizabeth Bastoni. The Nominations, Governance and CSR Committee is made up of three members, met five times in 2022. Our participation was 95.8%. In 2022, we worked on transition with the new Chair of the Board, who took over last May. We also undertook the annual review of objectives and the performance of the CEO, and we also undertook an annual review of the sustainable development program, a follow-up of social policy, policies on non-discrimination, diversity and gender equality and, we also looked closely at the CSR activities of the Group.
Regarding governance, our work focused, at the end of 2022 and the beginning of 2023, on the selection of the new Directors and also review of criteria for Directors' independence. We therefore submitted to the Board the candidacy of two new Directors who would replace Marie-Pauline Chandon-Moët and myself. We recommended to the Board Véronique Laury to replace Marie-Pauline Chandon-Moët, and Carole Callebaut Piwnica to replace me. We particularly appreciated the international background of both of the candidates, and their understanding of governance issues. We think that these are key assets in order to work with the Board and help it accomplish its mission throughout the year. This brings me to the end, really to the end of my presentation, and I'm now going to give the floor back to the Secretary of the Board, Laura Vanhoutte.
Thank you very much, Elizabeth. I'm now going to present to you the changes in the composition of the Board for 2023. First of all, I would like to note the nomination of Héla Madiouni, who's the new Director who represents the workforce. She was appointed on the 30th of March by the BIC Group Committee.
Thank you, Laura. Ladies and gentlemen, shareholders, good day. My name is Héla Madiouni, I was appointed by the Group Committee on the 13th of March, 2023 to be Director to represent the workforce. I have a diploma from the ICN Business School, I have a master's in accounting and financial science and technology. I began my career at PricewaterhouseCoopers in 2006, I joined the BIC Group in 2013.
Since 2021, I'm in charge of consolidation and reporting. During the years I've worked at BIC, I have worked very closely with many departments, and I am keen to share skills and knowledge. I am determined to invest fully in my work as a Director of the Board, and I will do everything I can to make sure that I'm available and have enough time to fulfill this mission.
Thank you very much for your attention. Thank you, Héla. Other changes are submitted to approval by the general meeting. First of all, we're suggesting that we renew for a three-year period, the mandates of Directors Candace Matthews, Jake Schwartz, and Timothée Bich. Candace Matthews is an Independent Director for BIC since 2017.
She has more than 30 years' experience in managerial positions, and she's been a Director of many international corporations. Since she was appointed, she's been a member of the Nominations, Governance and CSR Committee, and a member of the Audit Committee. Subject to a vote in favor of the renewal of her mandate, the Board recommended that Candace Matthews be appointed Chair of the Nominations, Governance and CSR Committee to replace Elizabeth Bastoni, who is standing down. We're also suggesting that the mandate of Jake Schwartz be renewed. He's an entrepreneur. He's an Independent Director and has been for BIC since 2020. He's a member of the Audit Committee. The Board benefits from his skills in financial matters and management matters generally. The renewal of the mandate of Timothée Bich is also put to you for approval. Timothée is a financial analyst in London.
He has been a Director of BIC since 2019 and we benefit from his financial know-how. After 20 years on the Board, Pauline Chandon- Moët did not wish to stand again. In order to take over from her, the BIC family, which is a controlling shareholder of the Group, carried out a selection process in collaboration with the Board and recommend to you the nomination of Véronique Laury. Véronique, over to you.
Ladies and gentlemen, shareholders, good day. I'm Véronique Laury. I'm 57 years old. I've got three children, and I come from the north of France. You may hear I've got a slight accent when I speak English. Everyone says, "What a lovely French accent you have." Nobody says I have a lovely accent when I speak French.
I went to Sciences Po in Paris. I spent most of my career in retailing, mass market retailing. I spent 14 years at Leroy Merlin. 16 years at Kingfisher. Kingfisher is the number two company in Europe for do it yourself retailing. Number four worldwide. 80,000 people on its payroll. About EUR 11 billion in sales, when I led it was in the FTSE 100 index. I have a lot of skills, I think it's fair to say. Initially working with consumers when I started working at Leroy Merlin. I started in the store, that's compulsory. I was in charge of consumer studies, I know a lot about consumers, product development, the supply chain, and sourcing, and marketing.
Before being the CEO for Kingfisher in France and then the CEO for the Group, that was a position I held for five years. For some four years now, I've begun a new phase of my career. I'm a corporate Director. I'm a Director of international firms of various countries, IKEA, Sodexo, and British American Tobacco. What does BIC stand for me? It's a brand. It's a well-known brand, of course, but it's a raison d'être, and it speaks to me. I have devoted my professional life to making home improvement available to everybody, and BIC produces staple products that are durable, and this really speaks to me.
I have a strategic vision, I have experience in leadership, and I will put these at the service of the company, together with Nikos, our Chair, with the CEO, Gonzalve, with the colleagues on the Board, and all of the BIC team, that I'm getting to know. I undertake to support the brand, to increase innovation, to improve competitiveness and sales, to deploy our leadership worldwide, to work on the sustainable development agenda, and first and foremost, because this is the heart of our job, to help promote and encourage the workforce at BIC. I'm delighted to submit my candidacy to you as a Director, and I prepared this short speech yesterday before I had seen these wonderful presentations. So I'm even more enthusiastic today than I was yesterday. I would be delighted to serve on the BIC Board.
Thank you, Véronique. Following the standing down of Elizabeth Bastoni at the end of this general meeting, the Board suggests that we appoint another Independent Director. This at the recommendation of the Nominations, Governance and CSR Committee, the Board suggests that we appoint Carole Callebaut Piwnica, who has a lot of experience, and subject to your favorable vote, the Board recommended that Carole Callebaut Piwnica be appointed Chair of the Compensation Committee and a member of the Nominations, Governance and CSR Committee. Carole, would you like to introduce yourself?
Ladies and gentlemen, dear shareholders, it's an honor for me to introduce myself to you today. I'm standing as a candidate for the post of Independent Director on the Board of this wonderful company. I'm convinced that my skills and my background will help to make a significant contribution to the success of the company.
I have legal training. I got a degree in law at the Brussels Free University. You may have noticed I've got a slight Brussels accident. We're all from the north at the moment. I also have a master's in law at New York University. I began my career in law. I was a barrister in New York and then in Paris. I worked on mergers and acquisitions in a number of international law firms in New York and in Paris. I continued my career as the legal Director of Agrifood Business Group. I became Vice President and then President, Vice Chair, and then Chair of a food ingredient company that had factories in 20 countries worldwide, very international.
That was a wonderful experience that helped me understand how important it is to have good ties between management and the workforce, to have industrial excellence and the importance of innovation. Subsequently, I set up my own investment fund in order to support food brands and sustainable development, mainly in the U.S. Once again, the key to success was innovation. I've experienced firsthand the importance of relationships with retailers and particularly it's so important to respond to consumer expectations. I've also been an Independent Director of a number of listed companies in France, in Great Britain, in Belgium, and this since 1996. I have been a member of a number of consultancy committees. I have, I think it's safe to say, thoroughgoing knowledge of governance.
If elected, I undertake to work very closely with other members of the Board, the Chairman, obviously, and the CEO and the whole management team to ensure that the company has good governance, continue to work on defining strategy, developing the product portfolio with an innovative approach which is consumer-centered and which meets consumers' environmental concerns. Ladies and gentlemen, shareholders, thank you for your attention.
Thank you, Carole. At the end of this general meeting and subject to the vote of the resolutions, the Board will be made up of 12 Directors, five will be independent and two representatives of the workforce. Ladies and gentlemen, this brings us to the end of the presentation relating to governance. I will now give the floor to Jean-Pierre Agazzi, who will read out the auditor's report.
Merci, Laura. Thanks, Laura. Ladies, gentlemen, shareholders, good morning. On behalf of the Board of Statutory Auditors, Deloitte, Grant Thornton, I'm pleased to report on our assignment for FY 2022, and to give you a summary of the various reports issued. In respect to the ordinary meeting primarily concern the financial statements and related party agreement. In respect to the extraordinary party annual meeting, our reports, three in number, concern possible reduction in capital through reduction of shares. Two possible issues of ordinary shares or securities giving access to the capital, each corresponding to a specific situation, to which we will return at the end of this presentation. As regards to financial statements, we've issued reports on the consolidated and annual financial statements. Reports that you'll find respectively on pages 293 and 318 of the universal registration document.
I propose not to fully read through these re-reports, but rather to present our conclusions. We've issued an unqualified opinion on the consolidated as well as the annual financial statements in accordance with provisions of the Code of Commerce. We brought to your attention the key audit matters to which the assessment of the recoverable value of the Cello cash-generating unit regarding a report in the consolidated financials and the assessment of the equity holdings in respect of our annual financial report. We also undertook the specific verifications as per professional requirements, and we have no observations as to the accuracy and consistency of the information provided in the management report, as well as the existence of information required by law and the report on corporate governance. We also issued a report on the consolidated statement of non-financial performance.
You'll find that report on page 150 of the universal registration document. Our work didn't highlight any material misstatements and allowed us to conclude the non-financial performance statement complies with applicable regulatory provisions. Let me remind you that your company, in accordance with the legal provisions in full, supplies the electronic format, ESEF, and we checked its compliance. We issued a so-called special report. Said report concerns related party agreements. It's to be found on page 322 of the universal registration document. It describes the agreements between companies who have joint leaders with big companies or agreements signed between your company and one of its Directors. We were informed of no authorized party agreements during the past year to be submitted to the approval of the AGM.
In addition, we have not been informed of any previously approved agreement by the AGM whose implementation continued during the past year. Our statement on sponsorship expenses prompts no observation on our part. Lastly, in respect of resolutions submitted under the extraordinary part of your AGM, our reports concern in respect to the 23rd resolution, delegation of authority to be given to the Board regarding an authorization to reduce the share capital. This report prompts no observation on our behalf. In respect to the 24th resolution, delegation of authority to be given to the Board to issue ordinary shares of the company or securities reserved for members of a corporate savings plan with cancellation of the preferential subscription right. For this report, we have no observations to make regarding on the arrangements to determine the issue prices of securities to be issued.
We won't express a view on the proposal to cancel the preferential subscription rights submitted to you insofar as the definitive conditions in which the issues might take place have not yet been set. Lastly, in respect of 25th resolution, delegation of authority to the Board in order to issue ordinary shares of the company or securities giving access to the capital in consideration for contributions in kind. The Board's report doesn't set out the arrangement for determining the issue price of possible securities to be issued. We cannot give our opinion on the items governing the calculation of said issue price. If that authority were to be used, we would issue a further report that would cover those particular item. This brings to an end our presentation. Ladies, gentlemen, shareholders, thanks for your attention.
Merci, Jean-Pierre. Thank you, Jean-Pierre. I'm now going to give you a summary of the resolutions put to the vote before we move on to the question- and- answer session. The priority there will be given to the shareholders. To summarize, we're putting to you the following resolutions. We're putting to your approval the corporate and consolidated accounts for FY 2022, having been aware of the various reports by the company and the auditors. We are suggesting the payout of a dividend of EUR 2.56 per share as of the 31st of May 2023. We're putting to you also for approval the special report of the auditors relating to the absence of regulated conventions for FY 2022.
We're also suggesting that we renew authorization given for the Board to operate on BIC shares within the limit of 10% of capital share for a maximum amount of EUR 1.3 billion and a maximum purchase amount of EUR 300 per share. In this respect, I would like to point out that regarding authorizations given by the general meeting, our company bought in 2022 a total of 725,703 shares. The average rate was EUR 54.23, and they were canceled. Also note that 63,553 shares were issued, delivered in 2022 in the frame of our free share allocation plan. We're also suggesting that renew the mandate for the Directors Candace Matthews, Jake Schwartz, and Timothée Bich.
Furthermore, we're suggesting that you appoint as Directors Véronique Laury for a three-year period to replace Chandon-Moët and Carole Callebaut Piwnica as an Independent Director for a three-year period to replace Elizabeth Bastoni. Resolutions 11 to 14 relate to the auditors. We are asking you to appoint Ernst & Young as the statutory auditor to replace the Deloitte company for six financial years and not to renew the mandate of the BEAS company as the alternate auditor. We're also asking you to renew the mandate of the Grant Thornton as a statutory auditor for a six financial year period and not to proceed with the renewal of the mandate of IGEC as an alternate auditor.
Over beyond the presentation made earlier by Elizabeth Bastoni, information relating to compensation can be found in the Board's report regarding corporate governance in Chapter 4 of the universal registration document for 2022. The compensation is put to your approval in keeping with the provisions of the Code of Commerce. Resolutions 15 to 17 relate to compensation policy, particularly the compensation policy for Gonzalve Bich, who's the CEO for 2022, and principles that will apply in 2023. Resolutions 18 to 20 relate to compensation for the Chairman of the Board in financial year 2022, to John Glen, Chair of the Board up till the 18th of May 2022, Nikos Koumettis, the Chair of the Board as of the 18th of May 2022, the compensation policy for the Chairman of the Board for 2023.
Resolutions 21 and 22 relate to the compensation policy of the Directors and the overall annual amount of compensation for financial year 2023 at EUR 600,000. Regarding extraordinary resolutions, particularly financial authorization, we're asking you to renew the financial authorization for the Board so as to reduce share capital by canceling shares. Resolution 24 relates to delegation of authority to be given to the Board so as to proceed with increasing capital by issuing shares that will be only for subscribers to a corporate savings plan with the cancellation of the subscription preferential right. Resolution 25 relates to delegation of authority to be given to the Board so as to decide the issue of shares in order to compensate for contributions in kind.
Now, this will be restricted to 10% of capital share without a preferential subscription right. The 26th resolution relates to the overall amount of issues to be carried out by virtue of powers granted, and that's up to 10% of capital share. Finally, the 27th and last resolution is just a formal one. Thank you. We have only received one written question. It's very technical. It's put by a shareholder, and the answer will be on the internet site of the company as of tomorrow. I now give the floor to the CEO for the question- and- answer session.
Thank you, Laura. We're now gonna open the Q&A session. Two hostesses will be doing the rounds with a microphone. Please raise your hand if you have a question. Good morning. I'm an individual shareholder. First question, why don't we hold the AGM in the new Clichy head office? Second question, the problem of the Chinese lighters, has that been resolved? Second question, we saw the Marne-La-Vallée factory plant. Given the level of automation, do you get it to operate with several shifts? Third question, rather more unpleasant, I would say, your unable to convince the financial analysts, not on your earnings, but of your future earnings given your share price. Your comment, please. Thanks. Good morning. Thanks for your question, Laura, for the AGM, for organizing the AGM.
Yeah. As you know, we moved our headquarters in June last year. We moved to Boulevard Victor Hugo at Clichy. Lovely location. We would have been delighted to hold the AGM there, but unfortunately we don't have a room with enough space because there's so many of you.
Update. Thank you. For an update on the Chinese lighter, Françoise will join us, who's head of the business segment, an issue on which he's considerably focused, but he's a tremendous expert too.
Françoise.
From the podium, Françoise, if you would, please. Good morning to you all. The issue of the Chinese lighters and the entry to various continents varies across continents. The continents, large geographies where market insurance has done very well in North America, Brazil, Mexico, New Zealand, Australia. Just one geography is far more challenging is Europe with market surveillance. Not specifically on the lighter, but is pretty weak. If I pick up the point about the continents that are fairing well in terms of market surveillance, well, no change, no deterioration. As regards Europe today, we see no signs of improvement, I say the situation remains unchanged. The only thing we could know is that during COVID, transportation difficulties, there was a temporary change to the arrival of products on various continents.
When we speak of lighters heading specifically for Europe, the answer, overwhelming majority, no. Around 90% of lighter models imported into Europe are not compliant with mandatory safety standards in Europe. That's what we see from the facts. Some of these lighters that are entering other continents, they're far better stops, so they're not really present on those markets, even if we find a few here or there. With your teams, you're fighting day and night, week after week, and at the end, we'll win. Absolutely. We're working, we'll continue to work steadfastly with the European institution so as to approve the standards that would allow us to be more effective within the EU and with a kind of moderate degree of success, so we say.
Thanks, Françoise. Fabrice, Mélanie spoke a lot about Marne-La-Vallée productivity. As head, could you tell us a bit more, please?
Good morning. Yes, as we saw, Marne-La-Vallée, all the Group facilities have automation levels that are broadly similar. All plants are working three shifts weekly with production capacity at weekends that may vary from country to country. Say that all plants are also working over the weekend once again at levels that are suited to the Group's requirements.
Thanks, Fabrice. Turning now to the results, the earnings, the share price. We don't comment on our share price, but with the team, the Board, and all our people, we're doing our utmost to convince all our stakeholders and shareholders the value of the company today and going forward. Yes. Good morning. I'm an individual shareholder. I have three questions.
The first ties in a bit with the earlier question regarding the share price performance. In spite of your leadership position, your very strong fundamental, is it's true that the share price doesn't seem to track the same trajectory when I look across periods? We're really, I would say, right at the bottom. I mean, it's not your fault, there's necessarily a link. I mean, other companies comment on their share price or do what it takes. I'd like you to say a word. Is it normal? Is it linked to a certain situation? Brief, a word would be appreciated from you. Second question on change in shareholders equity. Page 235 of the registration document, you talk about the impact of hyperinflation in Argentina. What's that about, that line?
I mean, it must be pretty significant because it was already included back in 2021. Is this same line item for other countries? It'd be rather a positive line item on the face of things. Share buyback, third question, page 21 of the notice of meeting. You talk about share buybacks with an ESG component. What does that mean? Thanks.
Just picking up on the efforts of the team and the company as a whole to showcase its market share, its brand long-term trajectory, the strength and ambition of their Horizon Plan. If you're looking for a comment, mine would be but disappointed, but motivated to do better and achieve a better result for us all. On Argentina, Françoise, maybe a brief word.
Regarding Argentina, in answer to your question, there's a specific context. It's hyperinflation at the moment in Argentina.
Argentina is a key market for us and this means that we have to do our accounting on the basis of hyperinflation. So those lines you saw in 2021, 2022 reflect that accounting method that we have to apply. To be a bit more specific, the hyperinflation effect when you're calculating earnings, net earnings per share is necessarily incorporated. So it's a particular accounting technique that you have to use. We could do the same with Turkey, that's also in hyperinflation, but as we say in the reference document, Turkey isn't significant for the Group.
Thank you, Françoise.
Just about your question regarding the share buyback program, ESG, it's a novel program that your company's begun to impleme nt in 2021, renewed in 2022 with Exane. It's rather technical, but the gain on these transactions, we redistributed that to ESG operations, notably the Esther Duflo J-PAL in favor of education. This is a two-year program and this year that we haven't renewed. Thank you for your question.
I'm an individual shareholder. You spoke to us about out of the box self-confidence. I'd like to talk to you about what's in the box. Notably the water consumption record, your carbon footprint, 'cause you indicate that it's dropped significantly in terms of its impact. What's the situation by division, lighters, pens or tattoos? There's a line that kind of strikes me. On workplace accidents, you have a target of zero workplace accidents by 2030, I believe. We see that over two years they've increased by 40%.
Thanks for your questions. Laura's gonna look in the documents if we have the detail by division. If we don't, we'll get back to you. We have it. I don't know if we have it available today. When we launched the Writing the Future Together program, we wanted to set this target of zero accidents, which was a major direction for all BIC employees to really tend to zero. We got over 10,000 people in plants throughout the world. Zero is very difficult to reach, but it's our daily target. We're putting in place training, control programs. Fabrice, at one point in his career was in the plants putting in safety barriers, so we're tending to zero. You're right, of past two years on, there was an increase over two specific items. With my team, we're keeping a close watch out on 2023, and I focus a great deal of attention on that.
Regarding the water and carbon breakdown per branch, we don't have it here today, but we can certainly answer that question in writing. We'll put it on our Internet site over the coming days. Thank you.
No microphone, unfortunately. I can ask a team member who's the number one specialist on all that. Broadly speaking, there's no two countries are alike. Every country is different. Some countries we buy 'cause we buy our electricity from the state. There we have a green certificate. We really privilege or favor wherever possible where we can have the directly green. We've invested in Greece, in France. We're working on one that we haven't unveiled in Latin America. We'll talk to you about that one next year. It's something which, together with the team, we're firm believers. An ambitious target, a 100% renewable green power. It's very important for our company for the image of our company, for the planet and the environment in general.
Yes. Good morning, Chairman. I'm an individual shareholder. Question on talents. What are your initiatives to attract and retain them? Same question for female talents. Same question for engineering talents, digital engineering in part icular.
Sorry, last part. Engineers? In the digital tech. Okay. While Mallory is joining us up here. Mallory is our Group head HR to talk to us about talent acquisition.
Very specifically, digital engineers.[Foreign language].
She will be speaking English. We do have interpretation, and you'll be able to hear her speak.
We have built an in-house talent acquisition team that we've ramped up. In fact, last year, our talent acquisition team brought over 400 team members into our organization. As you heard from Gonzalve, you saw in the video, we are absolutely focused on making sure that we are bringing talented women into the organization and that we retain those women at all levels of the organization. We set the goal of having 40% of our Directors or above, women in 2027. We have work to do, we're well on our way to achieving that goal.
That requires a relentless focus on making sure that as we have new opportunities open up within the organization, we're looking at our younger female talent, and creating opportunities for them to step into roles that will allow them to grow and develop and deliver incremental value to BIC. It also means that as we look externally to fill some of our most critical roles, we are ensuring that we have diverse slates of candidates, and we have parity in recruiting and making sure that we're bringing women into those more senior roles. On the very specific point of, let me first talk about a bit about retention.
We spend a lot of our time focused on retaining our women, and we do that in many different ways, and it's really just part of how we drive talent engagement across the organization. We're focused on retaining our women, but we're focused on retaining all of our high-potential team members out across the business. We're really proud of a signature series that we've developed, which is leadership development at all levels of the organization. We have leadership development for some of our senior leaders. That's called the Lead Program, where they have mentoring from executive committee and team members who are direct reports to the executive committee. They also participate in programs from world-renowned business schools, as well as have executive coaching and mentoring through some outside services.
We've launched this year two additional programs that cover a broader base of our team members, so Ignite and Illuminate. We're making sure that we have, if not equal representation of men and women, disproportionate representation of our female talent in those in those programs. We're also making sure that we're really talking very actively to our high-potential women about what they want in their careers. We know that that changes over time, right? For all of us, we're looking to balance a number of different things in our lives. What we want in our career at different moments in time can change. It's for men and women. Communication, active communication, active planning, ownership of...
We talk to women about taking ownership of their career and making sure that they're telling us what it is, that they'd like, and then we can match the opportunities that we have internally with the expectations that they have. On the very specific point about digital engineers, I would say that we are very actively looking to make sure that we have appropriate representation and equal representation of men and women in our more technical population. I'm actually unsure whether or not I would have any roles that I would call a digital engineer today.
I'll just add for you. We, in France specifically, have a partnership with 11 different engineering talent from. We have that in other countries as well. Sometimes it's one or two universities. In India, it's, like, 10 or 15. It's something that we're particularly attentive to, making sure that we're not only re-recruiting world-class marketing, sales, finance people, but we're also recruiting world-class production engineers and then digital the engineers of tomorrow. Thank you very much.
[Foreign language]. All of this will be provided in French on the company's website, over the coming days. [Foreign language].
Yes. Thanks. Hello again. Two quick questions if that's possible. The first, today the trend is on moving up to luxury. I mean, is it possible for you to develop the brands that are a bit more luxury connotated? Cause it would appear that everything that's dear or expensive works. Why don't you leverage that? Everything that's kind of mid-range isn't good. It either needs to be very cheap or very expensive. Second question, who are your major competitors, the ones that scares you the most, or is there a specific threat that we need to know about and against which you're doing your utmost to ward off?
Well, thanks for those two fine questions. I'm not gonna discuss the luxury industry. They're making their own noise. We at one point had a luxury pen division, Sheaffer, that we sold in 2012, I think. Either back in 2012 or 2013, if you want the date. It wasn't, it wasn't a success for loads of reasons. Probably the most obvious being that the distribution channels were totally different. Brand positioning was very different. These products were showcased very different and the volumes were very different. I recall the production volumes, the numbers we were getting monthly. At [Fabree's] factories, we were talking dozens of thousand and millions, and for Sheaffer it was in thousands. So there was a total mismatch with the business we were in at the time, so we sold that brand. We do have products that meet all consumer needs.
I'm not gonna talk to you about high-end, mid-range or entry-level, because all our products have unbeatable value for money that you'll recognize. We wanna be sure that we always have an answer for all consumers, whatever their needs. That's why we have ranges that we try to reduce and increase volume per range, but we're innovating and we're adding to the range. With the customers, it's one in, one out. It's constant effort by our teams. On our peers, on the competition, in each of our activities, in Human Expression, there are great many. There's one very big one under the brand Reynolds, Newell Brands in the U.S. that's bigger than we are.
It's the only one that's very much focused on the U.S., so we're fighting both to maintain our leadership here in Europe. As Samiya recalled strongly, we're outright leader in France, but also in other countries, Mexico, Brazil. I could run through a long list of countries in the world we're fighting on their territory, on their home ground that U.S. our teams over there are striving to gain market share. I'm very proud of the work undertaken last year by the teams. We gained market share against our competitor, but it's a daily task, a fierce competitor. At the same time, we have Chinese competitors. They're really low end, as you'd say, really low price, cheap. Have neither quality nor the value for money given by the BIC brand. That's the field.
Gentleman mentioned on one competitor like it's the no brand Chinese player. We're trying to fight against it in terms of regulations, imports, but also on the sales counter. We have the BIC France team with us together. I'd like to acknowledge that they've achieved fine market share gains in Q1 that you, Henri, plan to up throughout 2023. I have 200 witnesses, thank you. That's a daily task and it's really a challenging competitor 'cause doesn't follow the rules, play by the rules. We saw sooner or later in Europe will win the day. We managed to convince our European and national policymakers to do their job and implement the rules that they have drafted.
On Blade Excellence, we have Gillette, Wilkinson, but with new players, Dollar Shave Club, Harry's and others, but we're gaining market share year after year, so we're fighting big as a company with a strong history, whether small against the Goliath. Over 75 years, we know how to defend ourselves with no let-up. We're fierce.
No mic, sorry.
Yeah, Answer, that boosted sales.
If there are no further questions, we will proceed with the vote.
Oh, I think you might.
First of all, let me tell you the final quorum. We have a representative of 85.03% of capital with 36,681,066 shares represented. We're now going to show you a little film which explains how to vote with the tablet. In order to vote the AGM resolutions, you have been given a tablet. It is personal and can only be used to vote at this AGM. When a resolution is called, the vote window will be displayed automatically on your tablet, even if the tablet is on standby. In order to vote, it's pretty straightforward. You press the button, green For, orange Abstain, and red Against. You validate by pressing Okay, and that before the voting is closed. Once that you've validated your vote, you can't change it.
Please remember to give the tablet back when you leave the room. Thank you. First resolution, approval of the corporate accounts for financial year closed 31st of December, 2022. Voting is open. Voting is closed. It's resoluted. The resolution is adopted 99.97% of votes. Second resolution, approval of the consolidated accounts for the financial year closing 31st of December, 2022. Voting is open. Voting is closed. Adopted 99.97% of votes. Resolution three, allocation of earnings from the financial year, 31st of December 2022 and dividends. Open. Closed. It's adopted 99.99% of the vote. 4th resolution, auditor's account on regulated conventions. Voting is open. Voting is closed. It's approved by more than 99.99% of votes.
Fifth resolution, authorization to be given to the Board to allow the company to intervene on its own shares. Voting is open. Voting is closed. Adopted by 99.93% of votes. 6th resolution, renewal of the mandate of Director Candace Matthews. Open. Closed. Adopted 98.81%. 7th resolution, renewal of the mandate of Director Jake Schwartz. Open. Closed. Adopted 99.74%. 8th resolution, relating to renewal of the mandate of Director Timothée Bich. Open. Closed. Adopted by 96.08% of votes. 9th resolution, nomination of Véronique Laury as Director. Voting is open. Closed. It's adopted 88.14% of votes. 10th resolution, nomination of Carole Callebaut Piwnica as Director. Voting is open. Closed. Adopted by 99.48% of votes.
11th resolution, nomination of Ernst & Young Audit to replace Deloitte as statutory auditor. Voting is open. Closed. This resolution is adopted by 99.99% of votes. 12th resolution, non-renewal of BEAS as alternate auditor. Voting is open. Closed. This resolution is adopted by more than 99.99% of votes. 13th resolution, renewal of the mandate of Grant Thornton as a statutory auditor. Open. Closed. This resolution is adopted by 98.31% of votes. 14th resolution, non-renewal of the IGEC Company as an alternate auditor. Open. Closed. This resolution is adopted by more than 99.99% of votes. 15th resolution, approval of information relating to compensation as mentioned in Article L22-10-9 of the Code of Commerce for financial year 2022. It's an ex-post vote. Open. Closed.
The resolution is adopted by 93.43% of the votes for the corporate officer's compensation. 16th resolution, approval of fixed, non-fixed, and extraordinary elements making up total compensation and benefits in kind paid during or allocated under financial year 2022 and paid out to Gonzalve Bich, CEO. Open. Closed. This resolution is adopted by 90.41% of the votes. 17th resolution, approval of the compensation policy to be paid to executive officers for financial year 2023. Open. Closed. This resolution has been adopted by 91.01% of votes. 18th resolution, approval of fixed, non-fixed, extraordinary elements making up total compensation and benefits in kind that have been paid out or under financial year 2022 to John Glen, Chairman of the Board up until the 18th of May 2022. Voting is open. Closed.
This resolution is approved by 99.93% of votes. Resolution 19, approval of fixed, non-fixed, extraordinary elements making up total compensation and benefits in kind to be paid out during or under financial year 2022 to Nikos Koumettis, Chairman of the Board as of the 18th of May 2022. The voting's open. Now closed. This resolution is adopted by 99.93% of votes. Resolution 20, approval of the compensation policy for the Chairman of the Board for financial year 2023. Voting's open. Voting's closed. This resolution is adopted by 99.93% of votes. Resolution 21, approval of the compensation policy for Directors for financial year 2023. Voting's open. Closed. Adopted by 99.98% of votes. Resolution 22, fixing the amount of the overall annual compensation for Directors for financial year 2023 . Open. Closed.
The resolution is approved by 99.98% of the votes. Resolution 23, extraordinary. Authorization given to the Board to be able to reduce the capital share by canceling self-held shares. Open. Closed. This is adopted by more than 99.99% of votes. Resolution 24, delegation of authority to be given to the Board so as to proceed with an increase of capital by issuing shares which are only for subscribers to a corporate savings plan with cancellation of the preferential subscription right. Open. Closed. The resolution is adopted by 97.47% of votes. Resolution 25, delegation of authority to the Board to decide on issuing of ordinary shares or giving access to ordinary shares to be issued in order to compensate for contributions in kind, limited to 10% of capital share. Open. Closed.
This resolution is adopted by 90.47% of votes. Resolution 26, determination of the overall limits of the amounts of issues to be carried out by virtue of the delegations granted under 24 and 25. Open. Closed. This resolution is adopted by 98.88% of votes. Resolution 27, and it's the last one. Powers to undertake formalities. The voting is open. Closed. This resolution is adopted by more than 99.99% of votes.
Ladies and gentlemen, shareholders, thank you for your presence and your attendance today. It's an important moment for the Board of Directors, my team, and all our peoples to be able to answer your question, above all, to seek to transmit the commitment and pride that we have to lead the company and the brand every day. I'd like to commend our two new Directors, Véronique, Carole, and Héla. Your first AGM to the three of you. Thank you. Welcome to the Board. We're counting on you, on your skills, competencies, and support. Thank you, Nikos. I'd like to end on three words. Three words which for me have really marked the year 2022 for your company. The first is trust. We spoke about it earlier.
Trust that consumers have in this wonderful brand day in, day out, in the challenging macro times that we're experiencing. This value for money, this trust the consumer has in the use, not just in buying our products, but in the daily use right through to the end. The 3,000 m of writing of the Cristal, 3,000 lights of the BIC lighter. They have trust in BIC, and it's important. That's why they buy again. Also, the confidence of all our employees. Horizon was a plan crafted together, taking us to a goal together. Confidence that all our people have in this plan, and its implementation is crucially important for me going forward. Second word is dynamic. The momentum, it's super important. We see it day in, day out. I hope you see it in our results.
Continue to progress, gaining market share, sometimes, gaining just a little, sometimes a bit more. We try to do both in proportion, always whilst remaining right with the BIC brand, what it offers, and all the new brands we're incorporating in our company. This momentum is also in the acquisitions, the new teams that are joining us, the new businesses that we're learning and developing. I'm super excited by the new business of ephemeral tattoos. We have these products in major distribution channels, retail in many countries and globally very soon, I hope. Thirdly, agility. In 2022, your company's demonstrated high agility facing inflation cost, inflation, recession, a war that hasn't spread but was complicated to manage. A third year after 2021, and 2022, where the Group demonstrated its agility.
It's one of the key linchpins of the Horizon plan as shown by my team. Thank you, ladies and gentlemen, for your fleet-footedness, your agility, your leadership throughout the whole of last year, and supporting me in 2023. Horizon is our lodestar guiding us every day. I hope we demonstrated that and you're equally as much convinced of that as I am. Thank you all for coming, and I expect to see many of you on June 4 for the great dictation. May the best person win.
[Foreign language] Thank you, Gonzalve. It's time to conclude this shareholders' meeting. Thank you for your presence today, and declare the meeting adjourned. Thank you.