The parent company of Victoria's Secret says it is investigating a Bloomberg Markets Magazine report that underage, mistreated African children have been forced to plant and pick organic, fair-trade cotton used in some of the company's underwear.

Bloomberg highlights the "nightmare" of 13-year-old Clarisse Kambire (video) and six other children who work on organic-cotton farms in Burkina Faso that sell their crops to Victoria's Secret. The report says child labor "is endemic" to the production of cotton, the country's chief export crop.

"If this allegation is true, it describes behavior that is contrary to our company's values and the code of labor and sourcing standards that we require all of our suppliers to meet. These standards expressly prohibit child labor," Limited Brands said in a statement. "... Depending on the findings, we are prepared to take swift action to prevent the illegal use of child labor in the fields where we source Fairtrade-certified organic cotton in Burkina Faso."

The company said organic cotton produced with child labor was used "in a small portion of our Victoria's Secret panty styles."

Earlier this year, the U.S. Labor Department reported that Burkina Faso was one of more than a dozen countries using children in the production of cotton.

Bloomberg writes that "paying lucrative premiums for organic and fair-trade cotton has -- perversely -- created fresh incentives for exploitation. The program has attracted subsistence farmers who say they don't have the resources to grow fair-trade cotton without violating a central principle of the movement: forcing other people's children into their fields."

Child labor is banned by the international organizations that certify farms as organic or fair trade.

Clarisse Kambire's labor "exposes flaws in the system for certifying fair-trade commodities and finished goods in a global market that grew 27% in just one year to more than $5.8 billion in 2010. That market is built on the notion that purchases by companies and consumers aren't supposed to make them accomplices to exploitation, especially of children," the Bloomberg report says.