Linking PCF, LCA and ecodesign – A practical approach for the food sector

Abstract

Product Carbon Footprint (PCF) and Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) for food and agriculture products is becoming more mainstream as more companies adopt and integrate the process. On the one hand, food products have one of the largest shares of carbon emissions. On the other hand, primary production sectors feel the effects of climate change before any others, in price and availability of inputs, in soil and water quality, and in yields. In response, PCF studies are progressively being integrated in companies’ day-to-day activities. Reducing the footprint of products can, however, be costly. First, assessing the impacts of products can be time and resource consuming. For this reason, it’s important to start simple and use screening tools providing insights on hotspots and chain management. In this paper, we discuss how PCF and LCA are being used by companies in the agri-food sector to turn the issue of sustainability around. Instead of being a cost-inducing burden, sustainability can be a profit-driving activity for business. To support this conclusion, we present different improvement scenarios studied for an agri-food company. We show how LCA-oriented changes in ingredients, packaging and energy use in food products can provide companies with win-win improvements to their operations.